In our Fall 2023 newsletter, you’ll learn what’s making us encouraged, enraged, and inspired these days.

“Remaining frenemies with fossil fuel companies in the naive hope they will see the light on climate change is a losing proposition for humanity. It’s good that more people are starting to recognize that, though it will take political leadership to kick the recalcitrant fossil fuel industry to the curb.”

Mounting climate challenges, ongoing injustice and racism -- the challenges can seem overwhelming. But the Climate Equity Policy Center provides solutions. By supporting communities in adopting ambitious and practical policies that address climate change and economic and racial justice, we are doing the work of building a better world.

We've created a Climate Equity Policy Center fundraising team and will be participating in Climate Ride's Green Fondo bicycling event next May in Sonoma County. Let us know if you are interested in joining our team!

With the approach of Thanksgiving, our new resources on aging, equity, and climate change feel more relevant than ever. Our new resources look closely at how climate threats affect older adults, how those risks are amplified based on race and other factors, and the many policy solutions that let us build stronger, safer, healthier communities for all of us. Read our full newsletter for more about these resources, new research on children’s toxic exposures, climate equity jobs, and other things that have caught our interest!

Welcome to our fall newsletter! We’re excited to share a range of new resources and materials with you, including our new research review on smoke and health equity, co-authored with guest contributor Rachel Dent. Other items include our new logo, some reflections on the summer’s climate legislation, and an assessment of the dangers of the false climate solution of carbon capture and sequestration, as well as other news and commentary that have caught our attention.

Enormous thanks to the creative geniuses over at marketing agency Ready State for their generous pro bono work to help us redesign our logo! We are delighted with the final product, which incorporates elements of our previous logo but transforms them into a new and beautiful look.

Summer is winding down, but extreme heat, devastating summer floods, and wildfires are still on the increase. Camping with my family in Yosemite last week, we swung by the breathtaking Tenaya Lake, a large lake surrounded by dramatic granite cliffs and domes in the high country. But the closer we got, the denser the smoke from nearby wildfires became. “This is either the last scene in a tragic movie, or the first scene in a dramatic one,” said one of my children.

Climate change is forcing difficult and unfair choices upon us. The scale and intensity of wildfires are threatening vulnerable populations in California, across the West, and beyond. Yet a key solution – prescribed burning – also threatens California’s air quality, and is likely to disproportionately affect air quality and health for people in the Central Valley, which already has some of the worst air quality in the country.

It’s Earth Month, and springtime is making a compelling case for keeping this planet going. Here at the Climate Equity Policy Center, we’ve been busy tracking policy, supporting community priorities, and working on a variety of resources – keep your eyes peeled for some of these in coming months. See our full spring newsletter for some of our recent thinking, new happenings, upcoming events, and more.

Enormous shifts are underway, as powerful institutions at long last recognize the towering threat that now looms over everything.  Meanwhile, across our country and world, we see the least powerful groups at most risk from climate change. As markets, government policies, and everyday practices shift dramatically, everything hangs in the balance. 

We are pleased to announce that CEPC Director Sara Zimmerman will be speaking on preemption on an upcoming Climate XChange Deep Dive webinar in mid-May. Learn more about the threat posed by preemption to climate equity and just transition goals.

Biden’s failures to fight Big Oil have real human costs that are being felt right now. Whether it is oil spills poisoning waters and threatening tribal treaty rights, neighborhood oil drilling exposing families to toxic fumes and higher cancer risks, the air quality impacts of heavy trucking on communities hemmed in by freeways, or refinery emissions and explosions, Black, Brown, and low-income communities bear the brunt. And anger is mounting. Sha Ongelungel, media coordinator for the Indigenous Environmental Network, said, “We’re tired of waiting for you to put people and the planet before fossil fuel corporations.”