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Passing Comprehensive Climate and Energy Legislation in 2009
Message Strategy as of March 5, 2009
Background: In early February, the Climate and Energy Committee of the Green Group
agreed that a message frame was needed on post-stimulus messaging to help advance
comprehensive global warming and energy legislation in 2009 that includes a cap on
carbon pollution. Larry Schweiger, Chair of the Green Group, and President, CEO of
National Wildlife Federation distributed a memo to Green Group CEOs with a message
document attached, prepared by Jennifer Jones, Vice President Strategic
Communications and Christine Dorsey, Media Director for NWF and Co-Chair of the
C-Team. The document takes into consideration the vast amount of available polling
and message research, as well as the ever-changing politics of climate action. It has
received input and editing by the Climate and Energy Committee and the C-Team.
Revised messages are contained below.
Purpose of Message Collaboration:

Seize the momentum with bold new leadership in the White House and Congress
that makes it possible to advance solutions to America’s greatest challenges: the
economy, energy and global warming. All of these can be addressed with
comprehensive climate and energy legislation that caps carbon pollution.

Demonstrate support for President Obama’s directive to Congress in his
February 24, 2009 speech to “send me legislation that places a market-based
cap on carbon pollution and drives the production of more renewable energy in
America.”

Elevate the message that a cap on carbon pollution needs to be the linchpin of
any climate and energy legislation.

Advance message discipline among Green Group organizations and our
networks that focuses on primary messages that all organizations deliver
regarding the need to pass comprehensive global warming and energy legislation
in 2009, with a cap on carbon pollution.

Provide additional supporting messages for groups to pivot to that address other
related issues important to their specific constituencies and help them answer the
question, “Why do we need a cap on carbon pollution?”
Goals of Message Document:

Create surround sound that demonstrates widespread support for a cap as the
mechanism to make renewable energy more profitable, to reduce carbon
pollution and to reduce impacts of global warming on natural resources.

Establish message discipline without being prescriptive.

Continue to educate the public that putting a cap on carbon pollution will reduce
global warming.
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Provide working message document that will be revised as the legislative
process gears up. The document should be viewed as a sequencing document;
to be revised as events warrant. The document provides Top-line Messages,
Primary Messages for each “message bucket” (or theme), and supporting
messages.

Generate place-based stories that demonstrate the need for comprehensive
global warming and energy legislation in 2009 that includes a cap on carbon
pollution (stories being collected to be distributed soon).
Use of Document:

Distribute within Green Group organizations and network: The document is not
intended to, nor should it be distributed publicly. This is a working document to
be used within our networks to reach key audiences and constituencies through
communication channels, activist networks, etc.

Take it on the Road: Green Group CEOs and other voices in the network
including labor, civil rights, international, business, deployed to deliver messages
through radio tours, editorial board meetings, broadcast opportunities, blogs and
other communication channels. Plan is being developed.

Deliver at a minimum, the top line and primary messages. Choose additional
messages that might work better than others with your key audiences. Pivot to
more specific “message buckets” depending on your organization’s program
agenda. NOTE: this document does not include all pivot messages.
Global Warming and Energy Legislation: Basic principles

We believe America’s long-term economic health requires comprehensive
climate and energy legislation with a cap on carbon pollution that drives the
transition to a clean energy economy.

We want bold climate action this year that reduces global warming and deals with
its impacts.
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We want science-based and enforceable timetables for reducing pollution.

We want investments in the technologies that provide better energy choices that
transition us away from polluting fossil fuels and stabilize our energy future.

We want investments in people and communities who are hardest hit by the
impacts of global warming.

We want the bill to benefit the public, protect consumers and ensure that basic
energy service is affordable.

We want investments that restore our natural resources, because the health of
our economy depends upon the health of our natural resources.
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The Opportunity is Now: Meeting Today’s Challenges through
Comprehensive Climate and Energy Legislation in 2009
Top-line Message: Securing America’s Long-Term Prosperity
Comprehensive climate and energy legislation in 2009 with a cap on carbon pollution
will improve our economy, our security and our planet’s future. It will provide better
energy choices by driving investments to build, deliver and install clean energy
solutions, create millions of new jobs and reduce our dependency on oil.
Primary Message: Repower America by Advancing a Clean Energy Economy
America needs to meet the challenges of the 21st century by moving to a clean
energy economy. Delay is not an option. Americans want, and deserve, better
energy choices that only a clean energy economy can provide.
Supporting:

The economic recovery plan has jumpstarted the clean energy economy. The
next step is comprehensive climate and energy legislation with a cap on carbon
pollution to further galvanize clean energy investments.

America’s long-term prosperity depends on a critical choice: we can stay stuck in
the past and rely on dirty fuels with volatile prices, or we can repower America
with clean energy.

Clean energy solutions are economic and climate solutions. A cap on carbon
pollution is the mechanism that will advance these solutions.

Repowering America with clean energy technologies will improve our economy,
our security and our planet’s future.

Climate and energy legislation is comprehensive and solutions-driven when it
reduces global warming through a cap on carbon pollution. We must place
enforceable limits on carbon pollution and address the impacts that are already
being seen on the ground. We can create a strong economy and a healthy
environment by capping the carbon pollution that causes global warming.

We need to increase the use of clean, renewable energy like wind, solar and
geothermal. A cap on carbon pollution will drive investment in clean, reliable,
made-in-America energy technology, and will create millions of new jobs.
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
Americans deserve better energy choices that will reduce our reliance on fossil
fuels with volatile prices; better energy choices that create more domestic jobs in
the clean energy and energy efficiency sectors; better energy choices that
reduce global warming pollution; better energy choices that protect our natural
resources -- better energy choices that only a clean energy economy can deliver.

Investments in clean energy and energy efficiency will save Americans money.
Primary Message: America at a Crossroads
America is at a crossroads. We can continue to overload the planet with carbon
pollution that harms public health, threatens our food and water supplies and harms
nature, or we can embrace a new future with clean energy technologies.
Supporting:

Americans voted for change and the change agenda “starts with energy” as
President Obama has said. We need to advance solutions to America’s greatest
challenges: the economy, energy and global warming through comprehensive
climate and energy legislation that cabs carbon pollution.

America can lead or be left behind in the clean energy revolution. We need to
build the technologies here at home that the world will buy. If we build it, they
will buy it.

We can continue to wait and watch the impacts of global warming worsen and
the costs of impacts increase, or we can act now to reduce the harm to our
economy, our communities and America’s natural resources. Delay is not an
option.

Congress can pass legislation this year that gives Americans what they want: a
clean energy future, or Congress can continue to support the failed energy
policies of the past.
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PIVOT MESSAGES
Pivot messages are messages that are particularly important to certain messengers, but
not all messengers. These examples illustrate how to pivot from the top-line messages
into more specific messages organizations are accustomed to using. These can also be
useful in explaining “why” a cap on carbon pollution is so crucial.
Example of Pivot Message: Protecting Public Health
Primary Message:
Global warming will create significant human health threats across the globe. In the
U.S. these will include heat-related illness, worsening air pollution, extreme weather
events and a rise of infectious diseases. These impacts will place greater pressures
on limited health care resources. Only by reducing global warming through a cap on
carbon pollution will we begin to reduce these threats to public health. The longer we
wait the more catastrophic these public health impacts will become.
Supporting:

Global warming is threatening the life-supporting services that natural systems
provide: filtering the air we breathe and the water we drink, pollinating the crops
we eat and providing medicinal breakthroughs we count on to heal the sick.

Global warming is threatening natural systems such as wetlands that serve as
natural buffers that protect communities and people from storm surges and
floods.

Only by reducing carbon pollution and addressing the impacts of global warming
already being seen on the ground will we begin to reduce threats to public health.
Example of Pivot Message: Keeping the Carbon in Forests
Primary Message:
One of the best solutions to reduce global warming is to protect and restore forests.
Comprehensive climate and energy legislation that includes strategies to reduce
carbon emissions from deforestation is needed this year.
Supporting:

An acre of tropical forests is lost every second, accounting for roughly 20% of the
carbon pollution that causes global warming. Safeguarding forests is one of the
most cost effective and common sense ways to decrease the amount of carbon
in our atmosphere.
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
We cannot solve the problem of global climate change if we do not address
emissions from deforestation, along with efforts to reduce emissions from oil,
coal and other sources.

The U.S. needs to take a leadership role in safeguarding forests internationally
as part of comprehensive U.S. global warming and energy legislation.

Legislation should also include incentives to protect U.S. forests and improve the
carbon storage of agricultural soils.
Example of Pivot Message: Refueling and Rebuilding Transportation
Primary Message:
The transportation sector accounts for 1/3 of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. By
refueling America and rebuilding our transportation systems to provide clean
transportation technologies we can reduce the pollution that causes global warming.
Supporting:

Comprehensive global warming and energy legislation with a cap on carbon
pollution will spur investment in clean transportation technologies and help
provide Americans with better options for walking, biking and public
transportation.
Example of Pivot Message: Protecting America’s Wildlife and Natural Resources
Primary Message:
The impacts of global warming are already being felt: more droughts, more food and
water shortages, more severe weather. Congress needs to take swift action in 2009
by capping carbon pollution now to safeguard our communities, wildlife and natural
resources from the harmful impacts of global warming.
Supporting:

We all share responsibility to protect our natural world – to use only what we
need, make smarter choices and to pass on to future generations a world of
abundant nature and wildlife. Let’s protect the nature of tomorrow by capping
carbon pollution today.

Scientists tell we must act rapidly to reduce global warming or we face multiple
tipping points in the natural world from which we may not recover. Only by
capping carbon pollution and reducing the impacts of global warming now, can
we advance a new clean energy future for America for generations to come.
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
The longer we wait to reduce global warming impacts, the more costly it will be. If
we act now to minimize climate related disasters, we can save lives, protect our
natural resources and save billions of dollars. For example, as our climate has
warmed, forest fires have increased, costing the US government $1.5 billion in
2006 alone. More severe fires increase erosion, lower water and air quality and
put lives and property at risk.

A healthy economy depends on healthy natural resources. Global warming is
already threatening all of us: the air we breathe, the water we drink, the foods
we eat, the medicines we use. We need to reduce the carbon pollution that
causes global warming by capping carbon pollution.

The global warming problem consists of both a cause – excessive carbon
pollution; and effects – impacts on communities and the environment.
Comprehensive climate and energy legislation must address both.

Global warming is the biggest threat facing our wildlife and wild places. Already
we are seeing the impacts: melting sea ice is causing vital hunting and breeding
grounds for polar bears and other marine animals to disappear; we are losing our
coral reefs and the fish that rely on them due to increase ocean temperatures;
and we are also experiencing more frequent and dangerous flooding and severe
droughts threatening our important nesting and feeding habitat for migratory
birds. We must act now by capping carbon emissions to safeguard our wildlife
and natural resources.
Example of Pivot Message: Securing a Global Climate Agreement
Primary message:

Climate change is a global problem and requires a global solution. The U.S.
must move quickly to pass climate legislation this year that includes

provisions that support reaching a new global climate treaty this December
in Copenhagen.
Supporting:

Carbon pollution does not respect national borders. If we do not reduce
emissions globally, we cannot reduce the impacts of climate change here at
home.

The best approach to reducing carbon pollution globally is through a new climate
treaty. The international community, including the Bush Administration, agreed to
negotiate a new treaty by December 2009. We must move quickly to meet that
deadline.
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
The international community is looking to the U.S. to provide leadership. U.S.
climate legislation will be seen as an indication of what the U.S. will be able to
deliver in Copenhagen, specifically a strong cap on carbon pollution and a fair
and predictable U.S. financial contribution. Comprehensive climate and energy
legislation can achieve both.

Improving market demand for renewable energy technologies will drive down
global costs for these products, thus benefiting U.S. markets.

Other countries, including developing nations such as China and Brazil, are
taking strong action on climate change and are providing constructive leadership
in treaty negotiations. These countries are now looking to the U.S., as the largest
per capita emitter, to step up to the plate and provide the leadership that will
bring the world community together in adopting a global response to climate
change.

The countries most vulnerable to the impacts of global warming are also the least
responsible for creating carbon pollution. We have a moral obligation to help
these countries confront the changes to their communities that will inevitably
occur. The U.S. must do its fair share.
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Sample Soundbites:
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Climate solutions are economic solutions.
We must cap global warming pollution, now. Delay is not an option.
The science debate is over.
We need a better way to power our future and a better way to protect the
planet.
America’s greatest challenges -- the economy, energy and the climate crisis
can all be addressed with comprehensive global warming and energy
legislation that puts a cap on carbon.
A cap on carbon pollution will protect the planet, spur investment in clean
energy and improve our national security by reducing our dependency on
foreign oil.
A super majority of Americans want a clean energy future.
Reducing global warming requires a cap on carbon pollution.
A cap will generate private and public investments in clean energy
technology, and create millions of new jobs.
Let’s lead the global clean energy revolution. If we build it, they will buy it.
A healthy economy depends on healthy wildlife and natural resources.
Global warming is threatening public health. The longer we wait the worse it
will be.
We have to protect the nature of tomorrow, today.
When nature thrives, we thrive.
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