If we’re successful, we will not only be helping brands and businesses reclaim their carbon footprints, but we will be expanding access to clean energy to corners of our country that are often forgotten. We started Clearloop as total outsiders to the world of corporate sustainability, but with a deep passion to get in there, figure things out, and get things done. We’ve amassed some incredible support from academics, non-profits, companies, and just individuals who believe that we don’t have to sit around in despair–the beauty of Climate Action is that there’s room for bold, optimistic, and pragmatic solutions. We’re excited to dig in.
A big believer that there are lots of ways of getting things done. We’re launching Clearloop to do just that—leveraging the private sector to accelerate the greening of the U.S. grid, starting with the communities getting left behind. As Governor, Phil Bredesen helped establish Tennessee’s largest conservation effort since the dedication of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, saving 127,000 acres in the Cumberland Plateau. As mayor of Nashville, Bredesen founded the Land Trust for Tennessee, which has protected more than 126,000 acres to date. As a businessman, Bredesen founded Silicon Ranch, one of the largest Independent Power Producers in the country.
To many, including me not long ago, the climate crisis seems too big and complex for one person to have an impact. The reality is that with focus, we can. Aside from taking responsibility for recycling, energy conservation, and more sustainable living, our engagement with the brands we love and use every day can be harnessed to have a multiplying effect. By reclaiming the carbon emissions of our purchases from the US electric grid, we can eliminate almost a third of all carbon emissions in the US economy. This is among the greatest near term, large scale opportunities to make the US economy more sustainable and more resilient. This is the foundation of Clearloop and we hope you and your favorite brands will join us on the journey.
63% of US electricity is still from fossil fuels. The power sector is a leading source of cancer-causing air pollution, and the nation’s second-largest source of carbon dioxide.
Solar energy is a renewable, carbon-free resource available in every geographic region of the U.S., with enormous potential to reduce our nation’s GHG emissions. Any market or policy solution to address climate change must include significant development of solar energy to power a clean, affordable economic future.
If the goal of renewables is to mitigate climate change or reduce health and environmental damages, then the benefits of wind and solar energy vary widely depending on location, and the sites with the highest energy output are not necessarily the best for offsetting health and environmental impacts.
A number of private standards and certification systems include energy or carbon reductions as one of many goals, but in an effort to pursue multiple goals it is easy to lose sight of relative priority that should be given to carbon emissions reductions.
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