you very much for tuning in this is connect and we're excited because we're going to talk about climate and it just so happens today it is pouring rain so we feel is quite appropriate and my guests are just two wonderful people and they're going to tell a little bit of how they started this program and it's katie kingsolver and catherine bacon's and i've been katherine for years so it's kind of a treat we both care a lot about the symphony and a very i'd love to ask you where you started and how with oprah started it's a group of women and they made it kitchen tables as i understand conference about the environment for gardeners down in washington d c and i learned quite a lot about climate change and quite frankly we were alarmed because the information that we were learning from incredibly  smart experts was so different than the conversations that we're hearing in our community and we got together and decided to see if we could bring that conversation back into our communication by bringing in outside experts and holding a lecture series and having our people here have the ability to see how credible these experts were and ask their own questions great idea and i think one of the things that struck us when we were at this conference in washington was the urgency issue and i think we both had friends here who said i know about climate change but it's it's down the road sometime and what we both learned at this conference was that you know really the window for for action is today today it's now and so that's what prompted us to sort of get together and say ok what can we do  right where you know we're not big policy gurus we are but we can educate our friends in our community so that's kind of and think you are and four years later here we are and it's it's just wonderful to know that you exist and that you're out there promoting because heaven only knows it's needed desperately and the reason wonderful arnot gold bridge recently in paris and with their mayor is doing there and i think we can do that we can do this and she's closed down the shops it is a every other sunday and she's just gotten so many millions of she is there and she mayor of paris she's in a position where she can help a little bit more well that's the good news is that leaders around the world are really billions of people of this deadening up and taking action like that there's another one where everyone turns off the lights at night so all the monuments that are lit up or go dark and it it's not only symbolic sort of people say oh why isn't the  up but it you know it's an actual steps you know sort of starts a chain of thoughts and people's minds and that's what we're trying to do and kathleen has been really the force and passion behind creating two programs that we have one is the lecture series but then we also have a primer that just gives the basic science and data behind one time and change for people who sort of know about it but want to brush up on and they want to know all the facts so or for people who have a curmudgeonly uncle around them staring table and they don't have the facts at their hands to really discuss it clearly and in a way that is persuasive because i think this is such an emotional topic we all have to feel about it and our hearts more than we learn about it with our heads and we are all about keeping our information grounded in fact we only bring out information that is scientifically based that's been vetted by scientists and once you do the story is so compelling it is compelling it's one new flick coming and people are beginning to talk about it and there's and hear more about that did you i think in this area people are saying well you know we watch the pipeline going to see if we can do so that is a very important issue for this area but it's not our issue  we don't take a position on specific ways of addressing climate change or say that we believe very strongly that it needs to be address we believe that people need to come together and raise their voices let their legislators know that we need grownups in the room to address it and it's complicated and it is not an easy issue and we are not going to tell people whether a pipeline is good or bad but we do believe we need to use less carbon and we do believe that there are both regulatory ways and market approaches that make sense that should be tried and yeah i think you know what we're trying to do is as i said get people to talk about it and come into a conversation exactly and you know whether that conversation is ok let's sit down and look at the pipeline issue or let's sit down and look at solar or you know let's talk about sea level rise you know it's really just bringing up these topics that people have been shying away from because they might not agree with their next door neighbor well we need to figure this out just so we need to talk about it and that's really what this organization we have our we are founding zone of i feel like we're in the process of founding it is about it's about getting people to come to the middle situation at that point it's neighbor to neighbor children it's a graduate student used to in oceanography on campus and you happened to knew two wonderful people who were interested go up to mate every year and so you bring them together and i go it was a treat for all of our name for through all three of them and it's that kind of thing that we can do more of as well as children i think that the schools and things like community versity but they keep them out and they can say well we're doing this are you recycling or there is a wonderful woman diane landis who was very interested in everything that wouldn't use paper and the children got very used to it and then when they ran out of them for good this it will what's going on but it's that kind of thing in one household that can be put a head i mean can we can just promote it more to me but how can we as a community better you mean you're doing these programs which is really wonderful you said that you've been to a couple gatherings and that you're david crane energy we've also had infrastructure specialists policy specialists and so what we're hoping is that people will see one of the speakers talking about an area that they're interested in and it will be an entry for them to come in and learn and began to think about climate change as a more urgent issue that is a human issue and we don't see ourselves in any way as a green group or as an environmental group  we see climate change as a human issue that affects our geo political security on a me and our personal safety and everybody agrees that those are important and it's just kind of linking climate change to in danger in those areas that is new for people but the literature is out there and the experts are saying we just are always hearing it through so that's one of our initiatives that we think it's really forty fifty forty people you know now when we we are usually fully subscribed to standing room only which is great so the word is getting out people understand what we're doing they understand that we're not you know jumping on our soapbox and promulgating a specific position we're just trying to give information to people so that they can make their own informed decision about this issue that's going to affect us in so many different ways our audience should know where it's going to create it's going to be at mountain lakes and this is when the makers group who's got a whole group together and there's the most beautiful beautiful exhibit at the earth coun know courage you're going to go because it's you have to go through the open space to get money to get there which is an education in and of itself it is indeed so for many people who've never been i think rewarding so pleased to see the reaction that we've gotten for the primer because we wrote it again for the middle people who aren't necessarily there and it seems to be really resonating because it is so scientifically based and not emotionally based and people are bringing their husband and they're trying to bring it into their homes and to other communities have been asked to present it up and down the east coast and even as far out as california so it's been she's really her exciting thanks i think we're so thrilled and it's just that it's resonating somehow people are just so very different and the mayor of paris said oh no it's people and it's women and their children and it will go further and further and further so i love that as part of it being  ethic because we haven't had to have it drain way that's a very good point against me and part of the problem is the cost of our energy is not captured in what we pay and in fact as taxpayers we pay it through a different way which is not paying but it's not something that we see on our bills and we're paying for it in excess healthcare we're paying for it in environmental degradation so and we're paying for it in heavy subsidies to fossil fuel companies a fossil fuel subsidies are three to five times larger and then renewables depending on what country you're talking about in the world so we're actually paying fossil fuel companies to go out and find more carbon because it's been so important to us in the past and it's important to our security or economy but we're incentivizing the wrong behavior and we need to modernize the grid and we need to do it in a way that accepts the next generation of energy which is storage and distributed energy so it's very important that we realize especially now as we're talking about infrastructure there has been a wise way to do it and then there's a way that pleases the status quo and that's going to cost all of us a lot more go that direction it's a good leader a good point we do run into people say oh we can't we can't get off the old grid we can't make these changes quickly enough and you know we talk and in our group is a completely solvable problem we've got you know so many brilliant people working on it in this country and that's an important thing to keep in mind because i do feel that a lot of times people hear about climate change and  they just too much to deal with it you know there's no good news but that's that's not really true there's a lot of really wondering need innovation going on in the energy sector and lots of people at the local level are my parents never did and i mean you know the recycling and the plastic and paper newspapers and i mean i'm i think we're all very careful use and use a lot of of it of the newspaper now the newspaper but you know of a flyer this coming in and it's absolutely blank of the backside turned over and use it for your notes are gross it is rivers it is possible and i just feel that the younger generation needs to know more about it to be very eager for this pond and to size one of the children and aspect and i mean not necessarily little children i mean from thirty five on down to him or a whole the group of kids who you know are aware and they just keep moving on i mean david is a wonderful example david crane because he can speak to them and  and you're right the next generation will feel the brunt of this phenomenon and they are going to be the ones that are going to craft their ways to be more  it because they're going to have to be but the question is do we want to put them behind the eight ball well i want to give them more room to maneuver so they have more options when the changes yes indeed and that's our responsibility as stewards and we're falling down on that  definitely but i think you can also talk to the you know i think of businesses and what a difference they can make you get one person working for david cr and there's another angle or where ever i do think that there's just so much possibilities that small businesses including them better understand i mean there's an article in this week's us one people who read that a lot of businesses get into that and it would be good if someone read it and then said hey we could do this or why it's our or well we are presenting to the chamber of commerce very soon so we will be sharing a primer with them and we do plan to have an outreach to business i will say that larger corporations are actually leading the charge here yet when you take a at where much of the investment is happening it's the apples the googles of the wal mart and they are continuing to press that forward even today with perhaps the changes on a federal level and then something also that's very hopeful yes they do have a standard take and they can be very helpful in this planet cooling technology that and is really the earth's hope and if we can get that going that's very exciting yes and then it effects the weather patterns for all the other nations who makes that decision so if say china decides they need to do it and then causes are precipitation to totally change or our weather to totally change how do we handle that so in fact as we don't know how geo engineering is really going to play out and it's a planet wide experiment so i just caution that because a lot of people say i will figure it out that way and it will i think a lot of people do feel that well i mean i you know i think this is the one of the things where you know with innovation there's there always are certain if you know see what we're saying here you know do you remember how they're used before videos there was betamax and you know everyone thought which one is going to take over the market i think there is going to be a period where we try certain things and we see you know what happens in a global situation in a local situation and we're going have to figure this out and it's it's not going to be easy but it's you look at these to the live and as you say it's doable keep it keep it  keep going out there and doing your programs and if somebody in that why it is going listen i mean i have heard so but one of the reasons i invited you to come on connect it because i really do feel what you're doing is just wonderful and it comes out of the curtain clubs you know and there are there are many garden clubs in this community i know but it just can get better and better i mean i'm well you know there's a reason i think that we found it originally three members of the guard and i mean i should say that we are a team of six i think i would love to have you mention the six with kathy seven we're growing which is wonderful news ducks unlimited or whether it's the ottoman society but there are other like minded groups out there that are again in the middle that are very fertile grounds for this type of messaging  and they're just associations as in their churches there's no chamber of commerce there is rotary clubs and we would like to bring this message to all of them and as you said if one person hears it and thinks something either a new innovation or a new way of doing something in their own home in their own community or in their own business then we have at least started a change as well as a conversation which is just so important yeah i mean i don't mean to interrupt you but i just want to make the point that one of the things we wanted to do and we started this was to create a group that was replicable in other communities also to do something that was sort of low key and we thought ok what can the group of us who are sitting around a kitchen table do without a budget without funding just on around and that other groups and other communities across new jersey across the country could feel that it's such an a wonderful thing to get involved with and it's not political which i think at this time in our lives things are tough politically and we need a lot of events there and activities but we need some and totally separate and the garden clubs you know i hadn't realized i went to the philadelphia flower show and the most outstanding piece i saw in the whole show which was the trenton garden  thought oh my goodness this is just amazing turns out she now lives part time in atlanta or wherever it is but it was just wonderful and so you know whoever she is and she's not bland it's tell she's interested in the garden and perhaps she's doing talk there i don't know i just can't encourage you war and see if there's anything we can do to be helpful and i'm sure we can thank you so much  go to our website and she's going to put their own hand that are on the slide i guess at the end info at sea change conversations dot com and that see hyphen change  that's the big one and people can there's a place on the website to sign up and that immediately puts you on our list for the newsletter you know we have a facebook page where we try to post articles that we think are interesting and topical sometimes you know we usually send the articles around in the morning the six of us should we post this you know this is broad based interest enough you know does that we don't want to be political with so there's a lot of sort of factual stuff on the facebook page that kind of what we're thinking about right and sometimes it's you know a passing fad we thought that somebody had but we would like to keep the conversation alive and just  wonderful so if they have any interest and or and sponsoring us to do it in their business or in their association and the is contact our web site as well let's do it well i can't thank you know goldman both king and katherine it's been such a treat and we just look forward to having more and more gatherings so but when you get a new idea or you hear something please come back really how do you and thanks so much thank you so much thank you for joining us this is connected and we will see you next time