Bill McKibben, author of “The End of Nature” and founder of the global grassroots organization 350.org, started off the University Lecture Series with an environmental call to action.

“Global warming is the biggest thing that has ever happened to this planet,” McKibben said. “Our job is to keep it from getting any bigger, to stop it completely before it is totally out of our control.”

McKibben spoke Wednesday in Syracuse University’s Hendricks Chapel at 7:30 p.m.  about climate change and the steps that need to be taken to control it.

Describing himself as a “professional bummer-outer,” the environmental expert began his lecture with a series of startling scientific facts.

McKibben said in the span of 45 years, the Earth’s temperature has risen exactly 1 degree.

This 1-degree difference, he said, has led to 75 percent less ice in the Arctic, 30 percent more acid in the oceans, severe life-altering droughts across the globe and a 5-percent moisture increase in the atmosphere, which is responsible for the recent increase in worldwide natural disasters.

He then discussed the importance of taking action on a global scale and the organization’s three stages of operation: personal response, political action and corporate action.

“We can’t beat global warming one light bulb at a time; we must change the system,” he said.

Scientists have tried to take the next step to solve the problem. The government is supposed to protect its people and keep their best interests at heart, McKibben said, but in the last 20 years the two political parties have accomplished nothing.

“Congress is just a customer service department for fossil fuel,” he said.

The third stage of operation, McKibben said, is to find the worst corporate projects in the world for the planet and halt their efforts.

To truly stop global warming from destroying the planet, McKibben said, we need to go after oil on all levels.

In October 2009, the grassroots organization coordinated 5,200 simultaneous rallies and demonstrations in 181 countries protesting oil companies and the devastating effects their products have on the planet, McKibben said.

CNN called it the “most widespread day of political action in the planet’s history,” he said.

The grassroots organization hopes to have that same level of activity in its next series of protests.

One of the organizaton’s upcoming goals is to stop the Keystone Pipeline System from being built. If Romney is elected, McKibben said, the pipeline will definitely be built.

Another initiative, McKibben said, is to bring awareness to university student populations regarding how the university they attend spends its money.

He called for an end to educational institutions to make investments with companies associated with fossil fuels.

Thomas Rende, a junior newspaper and online journalism major, said he found the facts McKibben shared appalling.

“We have to be more involved. We have to take initiative for the sake of not only our future, but our children’s future,” he said.

Leah Davis, a junior natural resource management major in the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry, said though she was already focused on environmental issues, McKibben’s speech inspired her to get even more involved.

Scientists have said it may be too late for action, but McKibben plans to continue the fight and has called on students to get involved.

Said McKibben: “We are almost at war with the planet we were born onto, but we will fight a beautiful, peaceful fight to save it.”

 

Published on October 11, 2012 at 2:54 am

Contact Erin: erkelly@syr.edu