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Labor Network for Sustainability shares in the grief and offers condolences to the families of those who are missing or lost their lives in the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse.

Baltimore is home to resilient communities of working people, many of whom are engaged in the manufacturing, transportation, and logistics centers scattered in and around the port city - work that is threatened by the recent disaster. The Key Bridge was integral to the transportation fabric of Baltimore, the state of Maryland, the United States and the globe, carrying the final link of Interstate 695 across the Patapsco River while allowing access to the Port of Baltimore. Because of this missing link many of our rank-and-file comrades will lose work for weeks, and maybe months. This catastrophe will also have a negative effect on the city of Baltimore, which will threaten the revenue of a city still reeling from the adverse effects of deindustrialization, racist housing policies, and inequitable transportation.

LNS stands with those suffering in the wake of this tragedy, and those working to recover and rebuild. We urge a speedy replacement of this imperative transportation link with the idea of resiliency mirroring that of the union members that work tirelessly to keep the economic engine of Baltimore up and running.

Colette is the co-founder and Vision & Initiatives Partner for Taproot Earth and is a former corporate lawyer. Internationally, Colette has gained recognition for her outstanding use of the legal and judicial process to achieve environmental goals. After 17 years of work leading the Gulf Coast Center for Law & Policy development of programming focused on equitable climate resilience in the Gulf South, in 2022, she expanded her vision into Taproot Earth, inspired by her learnings with GCCLP and movement partners across the South.

“The climate crisis is THE defining challenge that humanity faces and is closely intertwined with the inequality crisis – as witnessed by growing food insecurity and population displacement, and biodiversity loss” said Celeste Saulo, Secretary-General of the UN’s World Meteorological Organization. 

Meanwhile, also in late March, global oil executives at the industry’s annual Cera Week conference in Houston, Texas, took turns denouncing calls for a rapid phase-out of fossil fuels. Amin Nasser, chief executive of Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, said “We should abandon the fantasy of phasing out oil and gas, and instead invest in them adequately.” His statement was met with applause.

Like the politicians and pundits in the movie Don’t Look Up, they act as if climate catastrophe will just go away if we choose to ignore it. Not really surprising, given that protecting the climate by reducing fossil fuel burning would reduce their profits and render their trillions of dollars worth of reserves in the ground worthless.

Whatever the oil barons may say, we at the Labor Network for Sustainability believe that both human survival and the wellbeing of working people depend on the urgent phase-out of fossil fuels. Climate change is a dagger pointed not only at our environment but at our jobs. AS LNS president Joe Uehlein recently testified, 

The fossil fuel industry and its allies love to spin the jobs v environment frame. We not only can, but we must, provide good jobs for our people, and protect the only planet we know of that can support life.

In this issue of Making a Living on a Living Planet you will find just a hint of what working people are doing to counter “THE defining challenge that humanity faces.”

By Veronica Wilson, LNS California Organizer

California Labor for Climate Jobs is hosting two CLCJ Worker Summits this spring, one in the Bay Area this past weekend and one upcoming in Los Angeles. Open to all rank-and-file members of coalition unions, the summits are an opportunity to learn about how climate change impacts us as workers, how taking climate action as unions can build the labor movement and current campaigns to create policies that are good for workers and the climate. Workers are coming together to discuss questions, identify problems, brainstorm ideas, develop solutions, and positively impact the fight against climate change while building a sense of hope. The first worker summit brought together workers from across sectors and unions and was a huge success.

On the policy front, CLCJ is supporting pro-worker and pro-climate policies, including proposals to fund a plan to make schools across the state climate resilient; establish high road standards for zero-emission vehicle battery manufacturing; improve transferability of certifications for displaced oil and gas workers; address Cal OSHA hiring for extreme heat protections for indoor and outdoor workers; and divest from fossil fuels. 

California Labor for Climate Jobs (CLCJ) is a statewide coalition of labor unions organizing for a worker-led transition to a just and climate-safe economy. The coalition includes public service workers, teachers, utility workers, domestic workers, healthcare workers, farmworkers, janitors, and many more.

For More on California Labor for Climate Jobs: California Labor for Climate Jobs

On March 6, LNS president Joe Uehlein testified before the House Committee on Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources:

Climate change is a job killer, and a budget killer. You’ve heard it said, and I don’t mind repeating it, that this is the only planet we have, and the voices of the future are calling back to us and asking that we see beyond our own time.  

The impacts of unchecked global warming and climate change will decimate our economy and ecology. Whether you work on the ports, or in the agricultural fields, or in a warehouse, or in transportation, manufacturing, health care ~ even nurses and public employees will all suffer job loss due to unchecked global warming and climate change. 

Renewable energy is a big part of the solution, for the climate and for working people. Geothermal energy is an essential part of the overall renewable energy mix, and provides clean, reliable, baseload power, with minimal carbon emissions. This will help reduce our reliance on polluting and climate destroying fossil fuels.  And the beauty of geothermal is that the job skills are readily transferable. Pipefitters in an oil refinery or nuclear power plant, or pipefitters that build big pipelines like I did, can do geothermal work. 

But it’s more than pipefitters. To do this work we need operating engineers, truck drivers, laborers, and carpenters, depending on how deep the hole is, like for the fracking process of enhanced geothermal, which allows for more efficient extraction of geothermal heat found deep in the ground. We need drillers, excavators, indoor plumbers, and workers who do HVAC work. Conventional geothermal taps heat sources closer to the earth’s surface. For both methods, the skills needed are all transferable. 

For Joe’s full testimony: https://www.labor4sustainability.org/articles/testimony-of-joseph-uehlein-on-h-r-7422-geothermal-cost-recovery-authority-act-of-2024/

There’s a war brewing against dissent.

• In Georgia, lawmakers are attempting to make it illegal for communities to protest and advocate against environmental injustice by labeling protestors as “domestic terrorists.” 
• Bills introduced in legislatures around the country would make it illegal to protest at industrial sites, whether publicly or privately owned. 
• In Congress, two Republican Senators have introduced a bill that would make it a federal offense for protesters to block public roads and highways.
• According to the Protect Dissent Network, at least 22 anti-protest bills have been introduced across 15 states in the last year alone, and more than 45 states have considered anti-protest laws in the last five years.

These bills are often justified as protection against climate protestors. But throughout American history such laws have been used repeatedly to criminalize workers who try to organize and strike. They are designed to threaten both workers and communities mobilizing to protect themselves from threats to labor and environmental rights.

The Labor Network believes that workers and communities have a common interest in preserving the basic democratic freedom to protest.

For more on protecting the right to protest: https://www.rightsanddissent.org/campaigns/defend-the-right-to-protest/ 

On March 21, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) introduced the Green New Deal for Public Housing Act. Its purpose is to take on the affordable housing crisis and the existential threat of climate change. The legislation invests up to $234 billion over 10 years to transition the entire public housing stock in the United States into zero-carbon, highly energy-efficient homes. 

The Green New Deal for Public Housing Act would dramatically improve living conditions for nearly 2 million people in public housing across the country. The legislation also creates up to 280,000 good-paying, union jobs per year, while reducing annual carbon emissions by roughly 5.7 million metric tons – the equivalent of taking over 1.26 million cars off the road.

A report called "The Case for a Green New Deal for Public Housing" has just been released by the nonprofit Climate + Community Project. It says  

This plan would deliver healthy green upgrades and deep-energy retrofits of the nation’s public housing stock to massively increase residents' health and quality of life, finally remedy the long backlog of repairs in public housing, and eliminate all carbon pollution from public housing buildings, while creating badly needed, high quality jobs in the green economy for people in public housing communities.

The Case for a Green New Deal for Public Housing: https://www.climateandcommunity.org/gnd-for-public-housing-2024

On March 7 the Providence, Rhode Island city council passed an ordinance requiring that all municipal buildings, including public schools, be carbon-neutral by 2040. It includes strong labor and equity standards that will create pathways to union jobs in communities that need them most. 

It urges that buildings be equipped with "electric heating and cooling systems, electric hot water heating, 100% renewable energy consumption, maximum on-site renewable energy production, thermal energy networks and biofuel or battery electric emergency backup facilities." The ordinance was initiated by Climate Jobs Rhode Island, described by the Providence Journal as “a coalition attempting to marry the interests of laborers and environmentalists.” 

For the full Providence Journal story: https://www.providencejournal.com/story/news/local/2024/03/07/providence-city-council-ordinance-will-give-teeth-to-climate-goals/72878324007/

Image credit State of the Global Climate 2023 Report

The UN’s World Meteorological Organization (WMO) warned on March 19 that 2023 was the hottest year on record. In a report on the climate, it found that records were “once again broken, and in some cases smashed” for key indicators such as greenhouse gas pollution, surface temperatures, ocean heat and acidification, sea level rise, Antarctic sea ice cover and glacier retreat. The report documented violent weather extremes – particularly heat – on every inhabited continent. 

The WMO found “a glimmer of hope” in the growth of renewable energy. The amount of renewable capacity added in 2023 was almost 50% greater than the year before, the report found, bringing it to the highest rate in the past two decades.

For more on the report:  https://wmo.int/news/media-centre/climate-change-indicators-reached-record-levels-2023-wmo

To download the full report: https://library.wmo.int/records/item/68835-state-of-the-global-climate-2023

The NRDC (National Resources Defense Council) has just issued a report called ACT LOCALLY: An Equitable Investment Resource Guide for Advocates and Local Governments to Access Infrastructure Funding and Activate Bold Plans

This resource provides local advocates and local government officials with key information about 46 federal funding streams and details on relevant state infrastructure policy and regulatory frameworks for all 50 states.

The report includes practical advice, such as:

Navigating federal grant programs can be dizzying, so it’s important to find allies and collaborators—typically, but not exclusively, in public agencies—who are familiar with the funding process and committed to community partnerships. Let your networks know that you’re looking to develop a competitive grant application. Your allies can become powerful champions for projects. The important thing is to put as much effort into strengthening relationships as you put into tracking funding opportunities.

For the full report: https://www.nrdc.org/resources/act-locally-equitable-investment-resource-guide-advocates-and-local-governments-access 

The nonprofit Breach Collective, with support from the Communications Workers of America, has just released a handbook for building worker power in the nonprofit sector. It’s called Organize Your Organization! A guide to unionizing your nonprofit workplace. 

It includes “a step-by-step guide and all the resources you need to form a union at your workplace.”

Their slogan: “If you have a cause, you need a union.”

Download Organize Your Organization!: https://www.organizeyour.org

For additional resources from the Breach Collective: www.organizeyour.org/resources

"Champions” features current and historic figures who can inspire the struggle for a worker - and climate - safe world.

In Memoriam

Dorie Ladner, lifelong civil rights activist and a mentor to both LNS Co-Executive Director Joshua Dedmond and LNS Development Manager Yasmin Gabriel, died March 11 at 81.

Dorie was born in Hattiesburg, Mississippi and grew up in the nearby Black community of Palmers Crossing. Enraged by the racism she experienced and observed, Dorie became a civil rights activist at an early age. She and her sister Joyce Ladner joined a youth chapter of the NAACP in Hattiesburg when they were in high school. In her freshman year at Jackson State College she was expelled for supporting the Tougaloo Nine, students who were attempting to desegregate the public library in Jackson. The next year she was arrested for attempting to desegregate a Woolworth’s lunch counter. That same year she worked with SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) and CORE (Congress of Racial Equality) to register disenfranchised black voters and end racial segregation in public accommodations. She was a key organizer in SNCC’s Mississippi Freedom Summer.

Until her death in 2024, she continued organizing as a social and political activist against U.S. wars of aggression and was actively engaged in mobilization for a just U.S. policy in the Middle East. Ladner traveled across the country speaking about the people’s history of the Civil Rights Movement and contemporary social justice issues.

Her work in the civil rights movement, she said, gave her “an ability to see injustices, and to want to deal with them in the workplace, politically, in your apartment building, on your street, wherever you are.”

For more on Dorie Ladner: https://www.zinnedproject.org/materials/ladner-dorie/ 

For Dorie Ladner’s obituary: https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2024/03/13/dorie-ladner-civil-rights-dead/

Our Mission

To be a relentless force for urgent, science-based climate action by building a powerful labor-climate movement to secure an ecologically sustainable and economically just future where everyone can make a living on a living planet.

Making a Living on a Living Planet is published by the Labor Network for Sustainability: