Hats off to those rare celebrities committed to living their values. Actor, director Mark Ruffalo has formed a non-profit, WaterDefense.org, seeking to counter the media rhetoric on natural gas hydrofracking. I learned of this watching Ruffalo during a six minute interview with Stephen Colbert last week.
Ruffalo gets skewered more than once, but manages to squeeze in a few points, too:
"We have hydrofracking, tar sands, mountain top removal, deep sea drilling. All of these things destroy water. In particular, hydrofracking." ~ Ruffalo
The organization's website states,
"Less than one tenth of one percent of all the water on earth is safe and available for us to use. One in five people worldwide doesn’t have safe drinking water. One in two don’t have water for sanitation... America has a choice between dirty fossil fuels that poison water and clean energy that rebuilds our economy. Water Defense's mission is to make sure America makes the right choice. Water Defense works to create a world where water is safe to drink, a world where the oceans don't rise and the economy is powered by clean, sustainable sources of energy like wind, water and solar."
WaterDefense frames the energy debate around what today's fossil fuel based energy choices are doing to water supplies, in addition to climate and the economy. The group focuses on educating the public about this perspective and, in particular, halting natural gas fracking.
Re: the economics -- in the Colbert interview Ruffalo claims the US Geological Survey
just reduced America's 100 year supply estimate of natural gas, stating
it believes we have 20 years of natural gas at current consumption
rates. We are apparently not "the Saudi Arabia of Natural Gas." See Ruffalo try to debate Colbert and convince America it needs to fast track a clean energy future here.
WaterDefense's most recent video:
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