YOUR SENATORS ARE CRITICAL!

August 26, 2009
Dear Clean Energy Advocate,
I'm writing because you live in a state where one or both of your Senators is considered critical.
Critical to passing a strong climate bill, and critical to making sure the climate bill does not turn into a bailout of the nuclear power industry.
Senate Environment Committee chair Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass) intend to introduce the Senate climate bill shortly after Labor Day. The Committee is expected to begin its work soon thereafter.
It is essential both that the Senate climate bill be much stronger than the House version (and NIRS was one of 300+ groups that sent a letter to Boxer today urging a stronger bill) and that the Senate bill not include a taxpayer bailout of the nuclear power industry.
*Because your Senator(s) is on our key votes list, please send a letter to them now here.
*And, for the first time, we've set it up so you can send a fax to your Senators if you'd like (just check the box that says "send fax"). This is even more effective than e-mail. But we have to pay for these faxes! So, if at all possible, please make a small donation to help us cover the cost of these faxes.
It will be very difficult to get 60 votes in the Senate to pass any sort of climate bill. And some Senators are arguing that adding billions of dollars of new taxpayer loan guarantees and other subsidies for the nuclear industry will help get the votes needed for passage.
But this is a ruse: the Senators who most want to spend billions of your money on new nuclear reactors aren't going to vote for a climate bill anyway.
And, because nuclear power is the most expensive, least effective means of reducing carbon emissions, a bill saddled with billions of dollars of nuclear subsidies would no longer be a useful or strong climate bill. Indeed, such a bill should be defeated and the Senate forced to try again.
Because the vote margin will be so close, we need to both support and keep up the pressure on those Senators who don't want nuclear subsidies. If their votes for a climate bill are in jeopardy because of nuclear bailouts, then these bailouts become less likely.
That's why it's important for all of us to take this next step, and e-mail and/or fax your Senators now.
And please help us pay for all these thousands of faxes here.
Not everyone on our list is receiving this Alert; only those of you in states where at least one of your Senators is a critical vote. And because your Senator(s) is critical, so is your action. Please act today.
Thanks for all you do,
Michael Mariotte
Executive Director
Nuclear Information and Resource Service
[email protected]
www.nirs.org
P.S. If you're on our snail mail list, you'll soon be receiving postcards for your Senators. Please fill those out and send them back to us as soon as you can. And if you'd like postcards for your friends and colleagues to fill out, or to use at information tables at concerts, conference and the like, let us know: [email protected]
And don't forget, it's not too late to visit your Senators district offices while they're still back home. Many are still holding town hall meetings you can attend. While many of these are oriented toward health care reform--clearly a crucial topic--how about going and asking about the health of the planet as well?
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