Zanagee Artis | |
---|---|
Born | 1999 (age 24–25) |
Nationality | American |
Education | Brown University |
Occupation | Climate activist |
Years active | 2017-current |
Known for | Co-founder of Zero Hour |
Zanagee Artis (born 1999) is an American climate activist. He is best known for co-founding the youth-led climate activist group Zero Hour in 2017. As of 2021, Artis was Acting Policy Director of Zero Hour. [1]
In high school, he started his high school's Sustainability Committee, which evolved into its Green Team. [2] In the summer between his high school junior and senior years in 2017, he attended a summer program at Princeton University. Artis states he began to start thinking beyond his local community after talking with fellow program participants Jamie Margolin and Madelaine Tew. They and other youth activists formed Zero Hour. [3] Zero Hour names colonialism, capitalism, racism, and patriarchy as the core causes of the climate crisis. [4]
Zero Hour organized the a Youth Climate March in July 2018 in Washington, D.C., with satellite marches held worldwide. [5] [6] Artis, as logistics director, planned the main event and coordinated with the United States Capitol Police. Artis states, "That was a real launching point for our movement, and it also inspired young people around the world. Greta Thunberg's Fridays for Future was actually inspired by the Youth Climate March." [7]
Subsequently, Artis worked with the Sunrise Movement on the September and November 2019 climate strikes. [8]
In September 2020, he stated that Zero Hour has shifted its focus to education. During the 2020 United States presidential election, as policy director, Artis led the #Vote4OurFuture campaign. The campaign focused on swing states like Michigan and Pennsylvania, with the goal of increasing voter turnout in support of the Green New Deal. [7] Artis stated, "We want climate change to be a top priority on people’s minds when they’re going to the polls in November because of the way it will impact people of color and people living in those cities." [9] Also in 2020, Artis was a keynote speaker at Verdical Group's annual Net Zero Conference. [10]
In 2021, Artis published his first book, A Kids Book About Climate, with co-author, Olivia Greenspan, another environmental activist. [11] Both felt that there weren't any resources to understand climate change and its implications in a way that wasn't overwhelming and created this book for both children and adults. [12]
In 2022, Artis worked briefly at Goldman Sachs in their financial crimes division, [13] but left in 2023 to spend more time working at Zero Hour. [14] He is also currently a Fossil Fuels Policy Advocate for Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). [15]
Artis grew up in Clinton, Connecticut and credits his childhood spent in Hammonasset Beach State Park with inspiring his interest in environmentalism. [2] Artis entered Brown University in 2018 and earned a bachelor's degree in political science and environmental studies. [16] At Brown, he served as the Secretary of the Black Pre Law Association, the Chair of Campus Life for the Undergraduate Council of Students, and the Vice President of Zeta Delta Xi. [17]
Renewable energy is energy from renewable natural resources that are replenished on a human timescale. The most widely used renewable energy types are solar energy, wind power, and hydropower. Bioenergy and geothermal power are also significant in some countries. Some also consider nuclear power a renewable power source, although this is controversial. Renewable energy installations can be large or small and are suited for both urban and rural areas. Renewable energy is often deployed together with further electrification. This has several benefits: electricity can move heat and vehicles efficiently and is clean at the point of consumption. Variable renewable energy sources are those that have a fluctuating nature, such as wind power and solar power. In contrast, controllable renewable energy sources include dammed hydroelectricity, bioenergy, or geothermal power.
A fossil fuel is a carbon compound- or hydrocarbon-containing material formed naturally in the Earth's crust from the buried remains of prehistoric organisms, a process that occurs within geological formations. Reservoirs of such compound mixtures, such as coal, petroleum and natural gas, can be extracted and burnt as a fuel for human consumption to provide energy for direct use, to power heat engines that can propel vehicles, or to generate electricity via steam turbine generators. Some fossil fuels are further refined into derivatives such as kerosene, gasoline and diesel, or converted into petrochemicals such as polyolefins (plastics), aromatics and synthetic resins.
The politics of climate change results from different perspectives on how to respond to climate change. Global warming is driven largely by the emissions of greenhouse gases due to human economic activity, especially the burning of fossil fuels, certain industries like cement and steel production, and land use for agriculture and forestry. Since the Industrial Revolution, fossil fuels have provided the main source of energy for economic and technological development. The centrality of fossil fuels and other carbon-intensive industries has resulted in much resistance to climate friendly policy, despite widespread scientific consensus that such policy is necessary.
Business action on climate change is a topic which since 2000 includes a range of activities relating to climate change, and to influencing political decisions on climate change-related regulation, such as the Kyoto Protocol. Major multinationals have played and to some extent continue to play a significant role in the politics of climate change, especially in the United States, through lobbying of government and funding of climate change deniers. Business also plays a key role in the mitigation of climate change, through decisions to invest in researching and implementing new energy technologies and energy efficiency measures.
The fossil fuels lobby includes paid representatives of corporations involved in the fossil fuel industry, as well as related industries like chemicals, plastics, aviation and other transportation. Because of their wealth and the importance of energy, transport and chemical industries to local, national and international economies, these lobbies have the capacity and money to attempt to have outsized influence on governmental policy. In particular, the lobbies have been known to obstruct policy related to environmental protection, environmental health and climate action.
Fossil fuel phase-out is the gradual reduction of the use and production of fossil fuels to zero, to reduce deaths and illness from air pollution, limit climate change, and strengthen energy independence. It is part of the ongoing renewable energy transition, but is being hindered by fossil fuel subsidies.
Individual action on climate change describes the personal choices that everyone can make to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of their lifestyles and catalyze climate action. These actions can focus directly on how choices create emissions, such as reducing consumption of meat or flying, or can be more focus on inviting political action on climate or creating greater awareness how society can become more green.
Climate change has resulted in an increase in temperature of 2.3 °C (4.14 °F) (2022) in Europe compared to pre-industrial levels. Europe is the fastest warming continent in the world. Europe's climate is getting warmer due to anthropogenic activity. According to international climate experts, global temperature rise should not exceed 2 °C to prevent the most dangerous consequences of climate change; without reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, this could happen before 2050. Climate change has implications for all regions of Europe, with the extent and nature of impacts varying across the continent.
An energy transition is a major structural change to energy supply and consumption in an energy system. Currently, a transition to sustainable energy is underway to limit climate change. Most of the sustainable energy is renewable energy. Therefore, another term for energy transition is renewable energy transition. The current transition aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from energy quickly and sustainably, mostly by phasing-down fossil fuels and changing as many processes as possible to operate on low carbon electricity. A previous energy transition perhaps took place during the Industrial Revolution from 1760 onwards, from wood and other biomass to coal, followed by oil and later natural gas.
The climate movement is a global social movement focused on pressuring governments and industry to take action addressing the causes and impacts of climate change. Environmental non-profit organizations have engaged in significant climate activism since the late 1980s and early 1990s, as they sought to influence the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Climate activism has become increasingly prominent over time, gaining significant momentum during the 2009 Copenhagen Summit and particularly following the signing of the Paris Agreement in 2016.
Climate change litigation, also known as climate litigation, is an emerging body of environmental law using legal practice to set case law precedent to further climate change mitigation efforts from public institutions, such as governments and companies. Finding that climate change politics provides insufficient climate change mitigation for their tastes, activists and lawyers have increased efforts to use national and international judiciary systems to advance the effort. Climate litigation typically engages in one of five types of legal claims: Constitutional law, administrative law, private law, fraud or consumer protection, or human rights.
Our Children's Trust is an American nonprofit public interest law firm based in Oregon that has filed several lawsuits on behalf of youth plaintiffs against state and federal governments, arguing that they are infringing on the youths' rights to a safe climate system.
The 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, more commonly referred to as COP26, was the 26th United Nations Climate Change conference, held at the SEC Centre in Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom, from 31 October to 13 November 2021. The president of the conference was UK cabinet minister Alok Sharma. Delayed for a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the third meeting of the parties to the 2015 Paris Agreement, and the 16th meeting of the parties to the Kyoto Protocol (CMP16).
Jamie Margolin is a Colombian-American climate justice activist. She is a co-founder of Zero Hour, a climate-focused youth organization that is part of Future Coalition.
Licypriya Kangujam is a child environmental activist from India. One of the youngest climate activists globally, she addressed world leaders at the 2019 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Madrid, Spain, asking them to take immediate climate action. Licypriya has been campaigning for climate action in India since 2018, to pass new laws to curb India's high pollution levels, and to make climate-change literacy mandatory in schools. She has been regarded as India's Greta Thunberg, though she does not like the usage of this term.
Sophia Kianni is an Iranian-American social entrepreneur and climate activist. She is the founder and president of Climate Cardinals, a nonprofit offering climate change information in multiple languages, serves on the EPA's National Youth Advisory Council, and as an advisor to the United Nations. She is the youngest United Nations advisor in US history.
Mikaela Loach is a British climate justice activist, author, and former medical student.
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Yusuf Baluch is an indigenous Climate justice and Human Rights activist. He started activism after experiencing the first hand impacts of the climate crisis in his community. He is an organizer with School Strike for Climate where he organizes with the regional chapter of Fridays For Future Balochistan.
This article documents events, research findings, scientific and technological advances, and human actions to measure, predict, mitigate, and adapt to the effects of global warming and climate change—during the year 2023.