Averting the climate crisis Al Gore

thank you so much Chris and it’s a it’s

truly a great honor to have the

opportunity to come to this stage twice

I’m extremely grateful I have been blown

away by this conference and I want to

thank all of you for the the many nice

comments about what I had to say the the

other night and I and I say that

sincerely

partly because I need that

put yourselves in my position

I flew on Air Force two for eight years

now I have to take off my shoes or boots

to get on an airplane

I’ll tell you one quick story to

illustrate what that’s been like for me

it’s a true story every bit of this is

true soon after tipper and I left the

White House I we were driving from our

home in Nashville to a little farm we

have 50 miles east of Nashville driving

ourselves I know it sounds like a little

thing to you but

I I looked in the rearview mirror and

all of a sudden it just hit me

there was no motorcade back there you’ve

heard of phantom limb pain

this

this was a rented Ford Taurus

it was dinnertime and we started looking

for a place to eat we were on i-40 we

got to exit 238 Lebanon Tennessee we got

off the exit started looking but we

found a Shoney’s restaurant low-cost

family restaurant chain for those of you

don’t know it we went in and sat down at

the booth and the waitress came over

made a big commotion over tipper she

took our order and then went to the

couple in the booth next to us and she

lowered her voice so much I had a really

strained hear what she was saying and

she said yes that’s former Vice

President Al Gore and his wife tipper

and the man said he’s come down a long

way

there’s been kind of a series of

epiphanies the very next day continuing

a totally true story I got on a g5 to

fly to Africa to make a speech in

Nigeria in the city of Lagos on the

topic of energy and I began the speech

by telling them the story of what had

just happened the day before in

Nashville and I told it pretty much the

same way I’ve just shared it with you

tipper and I were driving ourselves

Shoney’s low-cost family restaurant and

what the man said they left I gave my

speech then went back out to the airport

to fly back home I fell asleep on the

plane until during the middle of the

night we landed on the Azores Islands

for refueling I woke up they opened the

door I went out to get some fresh air

and I looked and there was a man running

across the runway and he was waving a

piece of paper and he was yelling call

Washington call Washington and I thought

to myself the middle of the night middle

of the Atlantic what in the world could

be wrong in Washington I remembered it

could be a bunch of things

but but what it turned out to be was

that my staff was extremely upset

because a one of the wire services in

Nigeria had already written a story

about my speech and it had already been

printed in cities all across the United

States of America’s printed in Monterrey

I checked and the story began former

Vice President Al Gore announced in

Nigeria yesterday quote my wife tipper

and I have opened a low-cost family

restaurant named Shoney’s and we are

running it ourselves

before I could get back to US soil David

Letterman and Jay Leno had already

started in on one of them had me in a

big white chef’s hat

tipper was saying one more burger with

fries three days later I got a nice long

handwritten letter from my friend and

partner and colleague Bill Clinton

saying congratulations on the new

restaurant out

we like to celebrate each other’s

successes in life

it’s gonna talk about information

ecology but I was thinking that since I

planned to make a lifelong habit of

coming back to Ted that maybe I could

talk about that another time I want to

focus on what many of you have said you

would like me to elaborate on what can

you do about the climate crisis III I

want to start with a couple of I’m gonna

show some new images and I’m gonna

recapitulate just four or five now oh

the slideshow I update the slideshow

every time I give it I add new images

because I learned more about it every

time I give it

it’s like beachcombing you know every

time the tide comes in and out you find

some more shells

just in the last two days we got the new

temperature records in January this is

just for the United States of America

historical average for January’s is 31

degrees last month was 39 point five

degrees now I know that you wanted some

more bad news about the environment I’m

kidding

but these are the recapitulation slides

and then I’m going to go into a new

material about what you can do but I

wanted to elaborate on a couple of these

first of all this is where we’re

projected to go with the US contribution

to global warming

under business-as-usual efficiency in

induce electricity and in use of all

energy is the low-hanging fruit

efficiency and conservation it’s not a

cost

it’s a profit the sign is wrong it’s not

negative it’s positive these are

investments that pay for themselves but

they are also very effective in

deflecting our path cars and trucks I

talked about that in the slideshow but I

want you to put it in perspective it’s

an easy visible target of concern and it

should be but

there is more global warming pollution

that comes from buildings than from cars

and trucks cars and trucks are very

significant and we have the lowest

standards in the world and so we should

address that but it’s part of the puzzle

other transportation is efficiency is as

important as cars and trucks renewables

at the current levels of technological

efficiency can make this much difference

and with what the node and some and John

Doerr and others many of you hear a lot

of people directly involved in this this

wedge is going to grow much more rapidly

than the current projection shows it

carbon capture and sequestration that’s

what CCS stands for it is likely to

become the killer app that will enable

us to continue to use fossil fuels in a

way that is safe not quite there yet ok

now uh what can you do reduce emissions

in your home most of these expenditures

are also profitable insulation better

design by green electricity where where

you can I mentioned automobiles buy a

hybrid use light rail figure out some of

the other options that are much better

it’s important be a green consumer you

have choices with everything you buy

between things that have a harsh effect

or a much less harsh effect on the on

the global climate crisis consider this

make a decision to live a carbon neutral

life those of you who are good at

branding I’d love to get your advice and

help on how to say this in a way that

connects with the most people it is

easier than you think it really is a lot

of us in here have made that decision

and

it is really pretty easy it means it

means reduce your carbon dioxide

emissions with the full range of choices

that you make and then purchase or

acquire offsets for the remainder that

you have not completely reduced and what

what it means is elaborated at climate

crisis dotnet there is a carbon

calculator participant productions

convened with my active involvement the

leading software writers in the world on

this arcane science of carbon

calculation to construct a

consumer-friendly carbon calculator you

can you can very precisely calculate

what your co2 emissions are and then you

you will be given options to reduce and

in by the time the movie comes out in

May this will be updated to 2.0 and we

will have click-through purchases of

offsets next consider making your

business carbon neutral again some of us

have done that and it’s not as hard as

you think

integrate climate solutions into all of

your innovations whether you are from

the technology or entertainment or

design and architecture community invest

sustainably majora mentioned this listen

if you have invested money with managers

who you compensate on the basis of their

annual performance don’t ever again

complain about quarterly report CEO

management over time people do what you

pay them to do and if they judge how

much they’re going to get paid on your

your capital that they’ve invested based

on the short-term returns you’re gonna

get short term decisions a lot more to

be said about that become a catalyst of

change teach others learn about it

talk about it the movie comes out the

movie is a movie version of the slide

show that I gave two nights ago except

it’s a lot more enter

painting and it comes out in May many of

you here have the opportunity to ensure

that a lot of people see it consider

sending somebody to Nashville tick well

and I am personally going to train

people to give this slideshow repurposed

with some of the personal stories

obviously replaced with a generic

approach and it’s there it’s not just

the slides it’s what they mean and it’s

how they link together and so I’m going

to be conducting a course this summer

for a group of people that are nominated

by different folks to come and then give

it in mass and communities all across

the country and we’re going to update

the the slideshow for all of them every

single week to keep it right on the

cutting edge working with Larry Lessig

it will be at somewhere in that process

posted with tools and limited use

copyrights so that young people can

remix it and use it and do it in their

own way where did anybody get the idea

that you ought to stay arm’s length from

politics it doesn’t mean that I’m trying

to convey Republican that I’m trying to

convince you to be a Democrat

we need Republicans as well this audit

you used to be a bipartisan issue and I

know that in this group it really is

become politically active to make our

democracy work the way it’s supposed to

work support the idea of capping carbon

dioxide emissions global warming

pollution and trading it here’s why as

long as the United States is out of the

world system it’s not a closed system

once it becomes a closed system with us

participation then everybody who’s on a

board of director people here serves

serve on the board of directors of a

corporation once it’s a closed system

you will have legal liability if you do

not urge your CEO to get the maximum

income from reducing and trading the

carbon emissions that can be avoided the

market will work to solve this problem

if if we can accomplish this help with a

mass persuasion campaign that will start

this spring we have to change the minds

of the American people because presently

the politicians do not have permission

to do what needs to to be done and in

our modern country the role of logic and

reason no long no longer includes

mediating between wealth and power the

way it once did it’s now repetition of

short

hot-button 32nd 28 second television ads

we have to buy a lot of those ads let’s

rebrand global warming as many of you

have suggested I like climate crisis

instead of climate collapse but again

those of you who are good at branding I

need your help on this somebody said the

test we’re facing now a scientist told

me it’s whether the combination of an

opposable thumb and a neocortex is a

viable combination that’s really true I

said the other night and I’ll repeat now

this is not a political issue again the

Republicans here this shouldn’t be

partisan you have more influence than

some of us who are Democrats do this is

an opportunity not just this but

connected to the ideas that are here to

bring more coherence to them we are one

thank you very much