Spokane, The United States, and much of the world experienced a blistering heat wave this summer that broke numerous heat records. Given the danger posed by extreme heat, The Gonzaga Climate Center has released a new Cooling Resources website where you can find resources for you, your family, friends, and...

Spokane, The United States, and much of the world experienced a blistering heat wave this summer that broke numerous heat records. Given the danger posed by extreme heat, The Gonzaga Climate Center has released a new Cooling Resources website where you can find resources for you, your family, friends, and...

The legislative session has ended, and while it was a mixed bag for climate-friendly bills, like every year, there are still plenty of opportunities to put pressure on elected officials. One of the most surprisingly easy ways to start is with the County Commissioners, and we hope the guide below...

Just like that, another year’s worth of bills are passed, and another Washington legislative session comes to a close. Though a lot of progress was made on climate this year, the actions taken this session fell quite short of the urgency of the climate crisis. We must continue to be...

Recently, I read an article from The Guardian which wasn’t a big surprise to those of us spending our free time trying to sound the alarm about the climate crisis, but it did make me realize that as climate activists, we need to start doing a better job of shining...

“If we could think locally, we would do far better than we are doing now. The right local questions and answers will be the right global ones. The Amish question, ‘What will this do to our community?’ tends toward the right answer for the world.” -Wendell Berry, 1991

Like many climate activists in Washington, I was dismayed when the legislature last year allowed the clock run out on HB 1099, a bill that would have updated the Growth Management Act to accommodate, among other things, the impacts of the climate crisis. The bill had wide support from environmental...

Religious Americans are more likely to believe the Earth is sacred and God commands us to care for nature, but very religious Americans are decidedly less likely to believe in or care about the climate crisis. In a Pew Center study surveying over 10,000 Americans 74% of believers affirm the...

The Spokane Sustainability Action Subcommittee (SAS) has worked for the last two years on creating a Sustainability Action Plan for the City of Spokane. The draft version of the plan is now available for citizens of the region to review and provide feedback. Over the summer of 2021 we will...

Attend the Catalyst For Cool Fundraiser Get Your Tickets Today Many Thanks to All of our Fundraiser Sponsors

The Spokane Sustainability Action Subcommittee (SAS) has worked for the last two years on creating a Sustainability Action Plan for the City of Spokane. The draft version of the plan is now available for citizens of the region to review and provide feedback. Over the summer of 2021 we will...

The Spokane Sustainability Action Subcommittee (SAS) has worked for the last two years on creating a Sustainability Action Plan for the City of Spokane. The draft version of the plan is now available for citizens of the region to review and provide feedback. Over the summer of 2021 we will...

The Spokane Sustainability Action Subcommittee (SAS) has worked for the last two years on creating a Sustainability Action Plan for the City of Spokane. The draft version of the plan is now available for citizens of the region to review and provide feedback. Over the summer of 2021 we will...

The Spokane Sustainability Action Subcommittee (SAS) has worked for the last two years on creating a Sustainability Action Plan for the City of Spokane. The draft version of the plan is now available for citizens of the region to review and provide feedback. Over the summer of 2021 we will...

By Andrew Kidde and Larry Luton As anyone dodging the potholes in Spokane’s roads understands, Washington State’s transportation infrastructure is failing. Traffic jams abound. Many bridges, like the Post Street bridge, are either out of commission or face deferred maintenance. Why? The cost of maintaining our roads is outpacing the gas...

As a reader of this blog there’s a good chance that you’re concerned about the climate. As an American, you’re probably also worried about retirement, given that fewer than half of us have any kind of retirement savings account or access to an employer-matched 401(k), while less than 13% have...

A good letter to the newspaper can work wonders for climate action, influencing leaders in government or business you may have trouble reaching otherwise, and educating lots of local readers as well. However, any letter published must compete for attention with everything around it, and opinion pages are busy places....

Recently I’ve been thinking a lot about how we communicate about climate change. Note, this is not, a discussion about whether climate change is happening and whether, if we continue on our current trajectory, it will be catastrophic. Nor is it a discussion about whether this is an exaggeration. Anyone...

There are a TON of great books out there that cover a variety of stories about the Climate Crisis. Here are a few recommendations from 350 Spokane

Climate change is already affecting our lives in the Inland Northwest, especially in one of our largest economic sectors: agriculture. We already see warmer temperatures, wetter winters, and different precipitation patterns. Overall, by the end of the century Inland Northwest temperatures are expected to increase between 5oF and 9oF and...

We did it! Before a packed room of supporters, the Spokane City Council adopted an Ordinance establishing a Sustainability Action Committee to plan for climate resilience, achieve greenhouse gas emission reductions, and support the goal of 100 percent renewable electricity by 2030. Spokane now joins 78 other U.S. cities in...

My first real awakening to the importance of gardening came when we discovered a hummingbird nesting in our yard. After a rain, Mama hummingbird would roll around on rosebush leaves to take a bath in beads of water. The two eggs she laid were the size of tic-tacs, and I...

Biomass is the burning of wood for electricity. Some claim this reduces carbon emissions because trees burned for energy eventually grow back, re-sequestering the carbon released by burning the fuel. For example, about half of the European Union’s renewable electricity now comes from biomass (and most of that wood comes...

The race for Mayor of Spokane has taken a strange turn. Not only have we learned that one candidate for Mayor refuses to believe the 97% of climate scientists whose research confirms that humans are the dominant cause of global warming, but in recent KXLY and KPBX interviews she advances...

What better place to capitalize on solar power than a city whose name translates to “Children of the Sun”? And in Spokane there’s been no better time to go solar, with handsome state and federal incentives due to taper off over the next three years, but still going strong right...

WOW! On May 5, Governor Jay Inslee signed the clean energy bill, SB-5116, along with several other bills to help reduce global warming. After two years of frustrating defeats of carbon tax initiatives here, this was a huge thrill for many of us in 350 Spokane along with other environmental...

This week our hearts are with everyone affected by the COVID-19 public health crisis, both in our state and around the world. It is heartening to see that the world can act with decisive action to respond to a crisis, if it chooses to. Yesterday was the end of the...

It was very literally a summer for the record books. Spokane went 80 days without rainfall, from late-June until mid-September, making 2017 the hottest, driest summer recorded. The remarkable fact was that this record-driest summer followed the record-wettest winter. As Northwesterners emerged in April from endlessly gray skies, grousing and...

The 350 Spokane Interfaith Climate Change Committee compiled a list of 12 actions you can take to contribute to the movement for a safe and healthy climate and future for all.

The Story of Plastics is a documentary film released on October 6, 2019, which aired on the Discovery Channel on April 22, 2020 and was hosted by 350 Spokane for free public screenings from May 21 – June 12, 2020. What follows are notes from the movie and from the...

Every major faith tradition teaches its members to love their neighbor, and in my own faith (Christianity) the rule to love our neighbor is one of the two great commandments. Stuck at home in front of the TV for the last few months three things have led me to rethink...

I believe that I am an optimist. One of the key characteristics of a mentally healthy person is optimism, and I like to think that I have it in spades. I was raised to believe in the power of positive thinking and to always look on the bright side. After...

Civil Rights icon John Lewis said “When you see something that is not right, not just, not fair, you have a moral obligation to say something. To do something. Our children and their children will ask us, ‘What did you do? What did you say?’”

As we all grow tired of the confines of this pandemic and the deaths of unarmed African Americans, we frequently hear people say, “I can hardly wait to return to normal.” This statement hits me like an electric shock, because that “normal” we’re hoping for, is what brought us to...

As the toll from California’s wildfires grows higher year after year, the state’s future appears fiery and hazy with smoke. For conservative columnists like Ben Shapiro, Niall Ferguson and Tyler O’Neil, it’s clear who is responsible: California Democrats. In recent opinion pieces, they acknowledge that climate change might play a...

On Earth Day 2020, 350 Spokane partnered with Sunrise Spokane, Fossil Free Gonzaga and League of Women Voters to organize a 3 day live online event where we discussed the state of the Climate Movement and where we go from here.

On Earth Day 2020, 350 Spokane partnered with Sunrise Spokane, Fossil Free Gonzaga and League of Women Voters to organize a 3 day live online event where we discussed the state of the Climate Movement and where we go from here.

On May 7, 2019, Governor Jay Inslee signed into law the Clean Energy Transformation Act (CETA) (E2SSB 5116, 2019), which commits Washington to an electricity supply free of greenhouse gas emissions by 2045.

On August 20 the Spokane City Council voted on an ordinance that creates a permanent Sustainability Action Committee that will update the City’s Sustainability Action Plan to include specific climate action plans to make Spokane more resilient to climate change, do our part to mitigate the pollution causing climate change,...

Our community finds itself engulfed in a layer of smoke so thick that it bumps up against the very top of the air quality index measurement chart. Communities have been destroyed, and dozens have died due to a wildfire season that is unfortunately not unexpected. Climate assessments have largely predicted...