Mark Ruffalo at Occupy Wall Street Talks Climate Change! (Video)

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Hollywood star Mark Ruffalo talks climate change, the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, corporate greed, fracking, and citizen activism at the Occupy Wall Street rally he takes charge of in this great video clip:

You have to love the line that it’s time to “turn our grief into winnable action. November 6th is a winnable action!”



Zachary Shahan (1960 Posts)

I'm the director of CleanTechnica, the most popular clean energy website in the world, and Planetsave, a leading green and science news site. I've been covering green news of various sorts since 2008, and I've been especially focused on solar energy, electric vehicles, bicycling, and wind energy for the past few years. You can also find my work on Scientific American, Reuters, Think Progress, GE's ecomagination site, several sites in the Important Media network, & many other places. To connect on your favorite social network, go to: zacharyshahan.com


  • Sundance

    Zach, I believe that President Obama has been advised that the USA will be vulnerable to economic risk and that there will be a greater threat to national security once we withdraw from Iraq and ME stability ends. President Obama must find ways to ensure an uninterrupted supply of oil from sources other than the ME. A huge % of the US economy and jobs are reliant on the transportation industry. If ME oil supply stops President Obama has millions of people whose jobs are dependent on oil supply that he must look out for. They elected him to protect Americans and thus he has to diversify and expand his oil sources. That is why he is financing Brazilian oil extraction in the Atlantic and releasing new drilling leases in the GOM. The pipeline would alow him to expand as Canada is a valuable and dependable source of oil with the ability to ramp up production if needed.

    Mr. Ruffalo is just some uninformed B movie actor with no credentials regarding national security and energy security? Nobody with a brain and an understanding of global threats to the USA will take him seriously. Climate concerns are at the lowest levels ever in America and I think this is why the pipeline expansion is a done deal and President Obama will support it. Obama realizes how many American jobs are at risk if oil supply plummets. He knows that Americans are vastly more concerned about jobs and the economy than they are about climate. That is the reality President Obama is dealing with in deciding what is best for ALL Americans and for his possible re-election.

    • http://importantmedia.org/members/zshahan/ Zachary Shahan

      I understand your POV, but i think this is bull. The economic hardship we will face as a result of not getting of fossil fuels sooner than later is much worse than what we would face by cutting back more now (and having higher gas prices more now). The price of food is going up due to climate change disasters. The price of disasters is TREMENDOUS. The price of record heat and droughts & floods is not something we want to mess with. We’re only at the very beginning of what we’ll see if we don’t change course.

      But what rich companies are there to lobby the president on that matter? There is no Mother Earth lobby that compares to the fossil fuel lobby.. yet.

      • Sundance

        Zach, first let me say that you make a valid point that I agree with regarding economic evaluation of potential impacts from climate change. However USA GHG emissions will soon be dwarfed by China whose emission will increase to 4 times that of the USA by 2017. India has announced that they have 300 years of coal and that they will be expanding coal power which will shortly make USA emissions look like nothing. If you put yourself in President Obama’s shoes do you think he cares about future considerations decades from now when he is fighting for his political life right NOW? He sees Libya heading for Sharia Law and Egypt is a big ???, and every military advisor is telling him the Middle East turmoil will escalate when the USA exits Iraq. The immediate threat that is on President Obama’s plate is unrest in the Middle East and energy security.

        The other fallacy that Ruffalo and others ignore is in thinking that if the pipeline extension to the USA is not built, the oil project will be stopped and emissions thus prevented. However this is false and while blocking expansion would be a symbolic victory, in the real world it is no victory at all as it will do nothing to lower emissions because the oil will either be delivered to the USA by some other means or it just go to some country other than the USA. It is a GIVEN 100% fact that the oil WILL be produced and President Obama is left deciding if he wants a more secure supply of oil to reduce exposure to the ME or risk continued dependence on ME oil. Again President Obama knows this and must deal with reality in making decisions that best protects all Americans. I’m willing to eat crow if my analysis is wrong but I think the pipeline is a done deal.

        • http://importantmedia.org/members/zshahan/ Zachary Shahan

          1st paragraph has no relevance. All Obama has to do is not sign onto the plan. This does not require any more time or effort than doing so.

          2nd sentence: I’m sorry, but if your biggest client says “no thanks,” demand for your product drops significantly, and less will be sold (and produced). Simple logic — don’t try to make this less obvious than it is.

          We do not need to stay addicted to oil. Money could go into clean energy options instead very easily. If a Republican, in bed with the oil interests, were to approve the pipeline that would be “logical,” but if Obama, who has said he would stop global warming (“stop the sees from rising”) does so, that is going to disappoint a huge portion of his constituency. That should concern him.