Yarra Climate Action Now!

Yarra Climate Action Now has graduated from a blog to a website!

This blog will no longer be active.

Go to http://ycan.org.au/ for all the latest climate action and news relevant to the inner-city.

Transition Town Yarra, a local group working towards a self-sufficient and sustainable inner-city, is hosting free movie nights on the third Wednesday of this month and next in Fitzroy.

Details:
7-9pm
Kindness House - level 2, 288 Brunswick St, Fitzroy

Wednesday 15 September - Peak Oil - Imposed by Nature

Produced by Amund Prestegard, 'Peak Oil - Imposed by Nature' is an excellent introduction to the causes and consequences of the terminal decline of global oil production as we reach the global peak. In the documentary retired geologist Dr. Colin Campbell, founder of ASPO, the Association for the Study of Peak Oil, explains the aspects and consequences of oil discovery, the production increase and the subsequent decline on a local as well as on a world scale.

Wednesday 20 October - Film about food

To get in touch please see the Transition Town Yarra facebook page or email transitiontown.yarra@gmail.com.

While we still don't know who will be our Prime Minister, one thing is clear - the Greens have been the big winners in this election.


Here in the seat of Melbourne, Adam Bandt won his party's first ever lower house seat (in a general election) with a massive 13% increase in the Green primary vote (to a total of 36%) and a 10% swing from Labor to Greens two-party-preferred. Nationally the Greens gained about 11.5% of the primary vote, an increase of almost 4% from last election, by far the biggest gain for any party.

It also seems like the Greens will win 5 or 6 senate spots, meaning they may win one in every state. In Victoria Richard Di Natale has been elected to the Senate with a full quota of votes. The Greens will hold the balance of power in the Senate.

Both Labor and the Greens said that climate change was the biggest issue in the seat of Melbourne.

In The Age, losing Labor candidate Cath Bowtell said, "...clearly they [voters of Melbourne] want us to work faster on reducing carbon emissions and moving to a cleaner-energy economy.''

This result doesn't bode well for inner-city State MPs, who are facing an election in three months. The Brumby Government will have to vastly improved its climate policies if it doesn't want to lose seats to the Greens.

We hope this result encourages some soul-searching in the Labor Party. With both big parties offering no leadership to tackle the climate crisis, more and more people will keep turning to the Greens. We hope all parties heed the signs at this election and greatly improve their climate policies.

Yarra Climate Action Now is proud to have been a part of the Vote Climate campaign in the seat of Melbourne. Our work helped make a difference in this seat and helped the party with the best climate policies win! Well done to everyone involved.

As heard on Radio National and seen on ABC News Breakfast...

Come along to hear Beyond Zero Emissions present their detailed blueprint for how Australia can be powered by 100% renewable energy within a decade. The Zero Carbon Australia 2020 Plan is essential knowledge for all Australians.


When: Wed 28 July, 6.30pm - 8pm
Where: Level 2, Kindness House, 288 Brunswick St, Fitzroy

Please RSVP to: yarracan -at- gmail.com

...and bring $5 if you want to go in on some pizza

The Zero Carbon Australia 2020 Stationary Energy Plan was launched to a packed out auditorium at the University of Melbourne on Wednesday.

To download the full Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy Plan click here (8.4MB).

Hard copies can be purchased from the Melbourne Energy Institute.

Don't miss out on this cutting-edge research, which shows how Australia can reach 100% renewable energy within a decade, using technology that is commercially available right now.

Great news for all Australians!

See media coverage on ABC Radio National PM and ABC2 News Breakfast.

YCAN is pleased to be hosting a presentation on the Zero Carbon Plan by Beyond Zero Emissions - come along to see how 100% renewable energy is possible!

Wednesday 28 July
6.30-8pm
Kindness House, Level 2, 288 Brunswick St, Fitzroy

RSVP to Yarracan -at- gmail.com

Last weekend volunteers from Yarra Climate Action Now doorknocked over 1000 homes in Collingwood and Fitzroy for the Replace Hazelwood campaign. We gathered hundreds of signatures for our petition and spoke to people about the urgent need to replace Australia's dirtiest coal-fired power station with clean renewable energy. We got a great response from the community.

While many first-time doorknockers were nervous at the beginning, with one hour of training and practice, over 20 people hit the streets and had a good time doing it!

First time doorknocker Phil said:

"Thanks for the chance to participate. It was a great learning experience.

"Oddly, I was pretty nervous right at the start. I was worried about how to do the opening pitch when the door was first opened. I went with my partner and watched her as she did a few houses and that helped a lot.

"Following that, and after doing about 3 pitches myself I got over my nerves and started to really get into the flow. I then found it really enjoyable, in fact it really fired me up!"


Our next doorknocking session is Sunday 4 July in Richmond, 1-4pm (one hour training, two hours doorknocking), meeting at Melbourne Girls College, Yarra blvd, Richmond.

We need your help! Sign up now here.

Yarra Climate Action Now has won the Yarra City Council Sustainability Award for Community Action (environment group) 2010.

We are very pleased with this award and want to thank and say well done to everyone that has taken part in YCAN actions and activities in the past - you helped!

We are lucky in the City of Yarra to have so many fantastic community initiatives and we were in a tough field full of excellent groups. Thank you to the City of Yarra for recognising the importance of community action.

The campaign to Replace Hazelwood power station with renewable energy (and energy efficiency) is gathering strength. You may have seen the coverage in the media recently as well as Hazelwood’s owners’ outrageous attempt to sabotage energy efficiency programs.

Hazelwood brown coal-fired power station near Morwell is Australia’s most polluting power station. Replacing it with renewable energy and energy efficiency would reduce Victoria’s emissions by around 12% and Australia’s by 3%. If we want to reduce emissions, we must start by replacing Hazelwood.

To do this we need your help.

The state and federal Labor governments are now under pressure to act after Kevin Rudd's backflip on climate change.

So, now is the time to get the message out in the community.

http://www.climateactioncentre.org/iwanttodoorknock

Over the next two months local community climate groups are going to be doorknocking in the key inner city electorates of Melbourne.

Door knocking is easy, fun and one of the most effective ways of getting our message into the community and having an impact on politicians.

Here is how it works. We start at 1pm and do about an hour of training, we knock on doors for less than two hours (in pairs) and then get together for a cuppa or a drink and talk about how it went.
http://www.climateactioncentre.org/iwanttodoorknock

It's easy! Residents are friendly and usually very happy to take some information or sign the petition.

No prior experience or detailed technical knowledge about Hazelwood necessary – we will provide training and materials. Doorknocking will be done in pairs.

YCAN will be hosting two doorknocking sessions:
Saturday 19 June in Fitzroy, 1-4pm
Sunday 4 July in Richmond, 1-4pm

There is also doorknocking happening in Brunswick, Kensington, North Melbourne and Westgarth/Northcote.

So please join us on a coming Saturday or Sunday by clicking on the link below and registering to doorknock. There is also a video showing how it works below.

http://www.climateactioncentre.org/iwanttodoorknock

To find out more about doorknocking and the Hazelwood campaign go here http://www.climateactioncentre.org/replacehazelwood

YCAN took part in yesterday's launch of the 100% Renewable Energy campaign by adding our voice to thousands of others via this photo of some of our members at the iconic "Fitzroy" sign on Johnston Street. Photos were taken by community groups all over Australia.

This new campaign is calling for an urgent transition to 100% renewable energy for Australia.

Is this possible? Is this affordable? The answer is yes and yes! Just one example of how we can do it is here.

Visit the campaign website for more information and to get inolved, or contact us at YCAN.

YCAN's re-branding sessions outside the office of Richard Wynne, Labor member for Richmond are catching people's attention. See coverage below from the Melbourne Leader and Melbourne Times.

Please get in touch to help with the campaign to get Victoria out of coal and into renewable energy: yarracan -at- gmail.com, or drop in to a re-branding session for a chat, every Wednesday, 5.30-6.30pm, 112 Smith St, Collingwood.

Every Wednesday starting 3 February 5.30-6.30pm, 112 Smith St, Collingwood - 'til the bastards put humanity ahead of coal industry profits

Our weekly re-branding sessions continue and we need you!!

After completing six weeks in a row in 2009, we will now attempt to have a weekly presence outside Labor Minister Richard Wynne's office until the November State Election or until the Brumby Government implements some decent climate crisis policies!

Our actions are already having an effect. Richard Wynne was one of the Ministers that successfully argued to postpone the allocation of brown coal for export to India.

We will be correcting the Brumby Government's image, to match its pro-coal actions, every Wednesday, 5.30-6.30pm, 112 Smith St, Collingwood.

WE NEED YOU FOR THIS TO SUCCEED – CAN YOU FILL A WEEKLY, FORTNIGHTLY, MONTHLY OR ONE-OFF ONE HOUR SHIFT AT THE PROTEST VIGIL ON A WEDNESDAY EVENING? If you can please contact us – Yarracan -at- gmail.com

Also, if you are a musician or performer and feel like busking while we do our rebranding, we would love to have you on a Wednesday evening.

Some recent Brumby Government climate change 'initiatives':

• Investing our money in the construction of a new coal-fired power station in the Latrobe Valley.
• Lobbying to get the owners of coal power stations more compensation from taxpayers under an emissions trading scheme.
• Accepting thousands of dollars in donations to the Labor Party from coal corporations in return for private meetings in which coal expansion proposals are discussed.
• Investing in research in so-called ‘clean coal’ rather than genuinely clean energy production like 24-hour baseload solar and wind power that actually exist.
• Going back on a promise to introduce a gross feed-in tariff which would pay owners of solar panels for all the electricity their panels produced.
• Looking into exporting dirty brown coal to countries like India.

(references for the points above available on request)

To get on the roster for a shift contact Yarracan -at- gmail.com or show up on a Wednesday.

Some fun and interesting climate change events happening in the next couple of weeks in our local area - all free and all welcome:

1. Renewable is Do-able public meeting - Thursday 3 December
2. Ride Planet Earth bike ride - Sunday 6 December
3. Walk Against Warming - Saturday 12 December

Details below:





The Walk Against Warming is Australia’s biggest day of community action on climate change. Similar Walks will be happening across the country, and across the globe as communities everywhere come together to tell their leaders they want action for a safe climate.

If you’ve ever replaced an old light globe with an energy efficient one, taken public transport instead of driving, switched to Green Power, or worried about the kind of world you’re going to leave to your kids, then the 2009 Walk Against Warming is for you!

12pm, 12 December, Victorian State Library (cnr Latrobe and Swanston Sts, City)