Are you an environmentalist? Read up!

Greetings Activists!

I am so glad that there are so many people interested in making Step It Up! Worcester a reality. We all know it takes a lot of hard work to reach our goals, and we couldn't be successful without a lot of dedicated people behind us.

No one knows better than you that our country is dangerously addicted to oil. This addiction is felt across the globe, but we can see its effects right here. The Union of Concerned Scientists reports that 64,000 deaths are caused each year in the US by air pollution, through lung and heart disease. The harmful gases spewed into the air are also responsible for asthma in children and the elderly, particularly in industrial cities, like Worcester. Not to mention the effects of carbon dioxide (a greenhouse gas), sulfur oxides (which create acid rain), and nitrogen oxides (which are responsible for smog) on plant and animal life.

As you may know, one of the main objectives of Step It Up! Worcester is to get 300 households signed up for GreenUp, the National Grid's green program. GreenUp matches each households electric use and puts it towards wind, solar, and low impact hydro power. This is a big step towards weening the country off of oil, and moving forward with cleaner, better technology. In addition, if we get 300 households to sign up for GreenUp, we can afford to pay the salary of the Energy and Environmental manager to overlook the efforts of the Worcester Climate Action Plan AND support more renewable energy projects around Worcester. So not only are we getting cleaner air NOW, we're working towards making Worcester clean for everyone.

The best way for you to support Step It Up Worcester's effort is to sign your household up for GreenUp! GreenUp is an option available to all households in Massachusetts, and you can choose to put 50% to 100% of your electricity towards clean, renewable sources. There is a calculator available on the website to see how much each option would add to your bill: http://massenergy.com/Green.Pricing.html Part of your bill will be tax-deductible and through the month of March, everyone who signs up online will receive coupons for Equal Exchange coffee, tea, or cocoa. Visit http://massenergy.com/Green.GS.html to learn more and to sign up!

For more reasons to join, visit: http://massenergy.com/Green.Matters.html

In addition to signing yourself up, why not get your friends, colleagues, and family signed up? If everyone on the list signs up 3 people, that covers more than half of our goal of 300! I'd love to hear from everyone that they'll commit to signing 3 households to GreenUp.
Send your commitments to Rachel, at rachel.l.hamilton@gmail.com.

Thanks everyone, and remember, we can't do it without you!
Rachel Hamilton
Canvassing Coordinator

PS - Feel free to get back to me with questions. :)