Believe it or not, the Earth is in need of a Band-Aid, and we’re at fault.
“If creation had a voice, it would say one word: ‘ouch,’” says the Rev. Clifford Cane, one of the speakers at Renew Missouri’s Power to the People benefit on Sunday at Mojo’s.
In 2008, the people of Missouri made their voices heard by passing a Renewable Energy Standard. RES requires privatized utility companies to get 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2021, according to a Renew Missouri news release. Sounds like a plan, right? Utility companies don’t agree.
A TA compliance report proving that 2 percent of company energy came from renewable sources was the first step in taking action, and so in April, three investor-owned utility companies filed their reports with the Missouri Public Service Commission, claiming to have met the requirement. All was going as planned until further investigation revealed that the companies hadn’t taken any strides toward sustainability, according to the news release.
But wait, there’s more. The release also states the MPSC failed to do anything about it.
This is where Renew Missouri steps in. As a project of the public interest group Earth Island Institute, the organization plans to file legal complaints with the MPSC, marking the first step in forcing privatized utility companies to pay fines for what they have, or rather, haven’t done.
The goal in hosting Power to the People was to raise money to cover the legal fees for taking the companies that cheated the sustainability measure to court, according to Renew Missouri’s website.
Though, with a name like Power to the People, I expected more … power. Flower power is a more appropriate term for what actually transpired. Picture a chill atmosphere full of environment conscious free spirits. There was even a Volkswagen car powered by vegetable oil. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the future.
The main feature of this renewapolooza was the tunes. Missouri Weather and Wait 5 kicked it off with in a folksy, bluesy fashion, spawning some impromptu (awkward) interpretive dancing. Stone Sugar Shakedown and Blake Gardener brought fresh beats to the stage. Mercer and Johnson, who was sporting a cowboy hat with his dreads, did their self-proclaimed hillbilly pop. Moonrunner played their indie meets folk meets epic jams while the Kay Brothers closed the night with what they’ve dubbed stomp-grass.
It wasn’t just about the music for these artists. Gardener and his guitarist say they support the cause.
“Green is my favorite color,” Gardener’s guitarist Sam Reed adds.
If their love of green is any proof, then Missourians will definitely want to keep the real “green” in the state.
“It’s important we see the energy here,” says Carla Klein, Renew Missouri’s clean energy coordinator.
Klein says coal mining and other unsustainable energy practices have left our planet scraped and bruised. Missouri, being heavily reliant on coal for electricity, isn’t helping this cause (hence the RES). Bought in Wyoming, Missouri coal purchases place 1.3 billion dollars annually into Wyoming’s economy, says Klein, who adds that it’s important to keep the jobs and money in Missouri.
“Energy efficiency is by far our greatest opportunity,” says John Wright, a candidate for the state House of Representatives and one of the benefit speakers.
All in all, more than 200 attended Sunday’s event, bringing in $2,000 for the cause, Renew Missouri director PJ Wilson says. For him, that counts as a success.
