4
" Instead of arguing about making sacrifices, let’s talk about how we can make money. Instead of pitting the environment versus the economy, let’s consider market principles and economic growth. Instead of focusing on polar bears, let’s focus on asthmatic children. And instead of putting all hope in the federal government, let’s empower cities, regions, businesses, and citizens to accelerate the progress they are already making on their own. "
― Michael R. Bloomberg , Climate of Hope: How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet
7
" Defense, it is clear, is not enough. To find an answer, we decided to mount the most intensive consultation process in the club’s modern history, inviting over five thousand grassroots leaders to participate in a series of meetings, surveys, and discussions. It culminated in our first national convention, which we held in San Francisco in September 2005. "
― Michael R. Bloomberg , Climate of Hope: How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet
9
" I didn’t know it yet, but this new priority would mean enormous changes in the way I saw the world and environmentalism. Previously environmentalists worked to stop bad things—pollution, clear-cutting, overfishing—but we more or less accepted the big-picture American economy, with the established industries that made it up. Not anymore. Now we were about to find ourselves in a different business: helping to foster a different kind of economic development, one based on knowledge and technology rather than fossil fuels. After thirty-five years of working to clean up after twentieth-century industrialism, environmentalists were about to plunge into creating its twenty-first-century replacement. But before we could go full tilt toward the new, we had to stop the last spasms of the old—an energy future crafted during George W. Bush’s first term by Vice President Cheney. "
― Michael R. Bloomberg , Climate of Hope: How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet
10
" Models are models - and the real world is different. For example, for the last three years the world economy has grown significantly, but emissions have stayed flat - which wasn't supposed to happen for decades. The commitments that nations made in Paris won't kick in until 2020, but many are already implementing their pledges and moving ahead of schedule. The Marrakech Climate Change Conference, around the time of the 2016 U.S. Elections, saw the rest of the world setting strong new goals, with Germany submitting a plan to cut its climate footprint by 95 percent, and twenty-nine new regional and local governments (many in China) committing to similarly deep emissions cuts. "
― Michael R. Bloomberg , Climate of Hope: How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet
