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Citizen’s Climate Lobby wants to take audiences to ‘Antarctica’

Screening will include Tesla presentation

Anna Washington, operations team lead for the Citizen’s Climate Lobby, is looking forward to the upcoming Park City Film Series’ Earth Month screening of Luc Jacquet’s “Antarctica: Ice and Sky.”

The screening will be at 7 p.m. on Thursday, April 27, at the Park City Library’s Jim Santy Auditorium.

“The cool thing about this film is that it’s about French glaciologist Claude Lorius, the first person who found evidence that [portions of climate change] was manmade,” Washington told The Park Record. “Since that’s the Citizen’s Climate Lobby’s main focus, it is nice for us to show a little bit of that history.”

The Citizen’s Climate Lobby is a grassroots nonprofit that works with elected officials to come to solutions about climate change, Washington said.

“We are trying to make changes through the political well and have the bi-partisan climate caucus that is comprised of 34 politicians, half of them are republicans and half of them are democrats,” she said.

Washington also said that climate change shouldn’t be a political issue, because between 97 and 99 percent of climatologists agree that some human activities such as burning fossil fuels and deforestation have been a factor in changing the climate.

She said anyone could make little changes in their day-to-day lives to help slow climate change, caused by greenhouse gasses that trap heat in the atmosphere.

“We can use efficient light bulbs or drive fuel efficient cars,” she said. “Something that I do personally is not eat a lot of meat. Animal agriculture causes a lot of greenhouse gasses that contribute to climate change.”

Washington said a mass amount of green house gasses, such as CO2 and methane, emits into the atmosphere from major companies.

“As much as we do in our own lives, it seems we need to make bigger holistic changes in big industries,” she said. “And I do think that big companies are making changes to not produce a lot of CO2, which is one of the major gasses that cause climate change, and help reduce the impact they have on climate change.”

The challenge Washington and others face is to continue to get more companies to change the way they operate.

“A lot of companies and politicians have vested interest to keep the status quo,” Washington said. “So, it will take a lot of work.”

Washington said she doesn’t feel it’s too late to slow down climate change.

“With some big companies changing, there is hope, and I think that people are starting to realize that,” she said.

In addition to the free screening, the Citizen’s Climate Lobby recruited Tesla Motors to give a small post-screening presentation.

Tesla is known for its electric cars, lithium-ion batteries and solar power program.

The company is currently building The Tesla Gigafactory 1 near Reno for its lithium-ion batteries.

“We’ll have a representative from Tesla who will talk about the progress on their gigafactory and their solar program,” Washington said. “They will also bring two vehicles — their Model S and Model X — for people to look at the sit in. They are gorgeous cars.”

The Citizen’s Climate lobby reached out to the local Tesla dealership and got the ball rolling.

“They were excited to have this opportunity to come get involved and contacted their corporate offices,” Washington said. “I think people are intrigued with Tesla and they have a great solar-power program.”

Washington is also grateful for the partnership her nonprofit has created with the Park City Film Series for the this event.

“First of all, it’s Earth Month and we wanted to be a part of that and show a film that corresponds with Earth Month,” she said. “The Park City Film Series has been great to work with to make this event happen.”

The Citizens Climate Lobby and the Park City Film Series’ Earth Month Film Series will continue with a free screening of Luc Jacquet’s “Antarctica: Ice and Sky” at 7 p.m. on Thursday, April 27, at the Park City Library’s Jim Santy Auditorium, 1255 Park Ave. For information, visit http://www.parkcityfilmseries.com.


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