On Feb. 27, 90 Cornell students traveled to Washington, D.C. to join over 12,000 young people from around the country for Powershift 2009, the largest national youth conference on global climate change to date.

After two days of workshops, discussion panels and speakers, the students rallied on Capitol Hill for carbon emission legislation, green jobs and environmental regulation,

Prof. Timothy Fahey, natural resources, noted that while the movement was thousands strong, the media coverage of the event did not overpower media coverage of other US issues. Given the current economic crisis, he said, the public has been more concerned with how to save money and budget properly than how to most effectively reduce their carbon footprints. “[Climate change] is now at the bottom of the media because we have something different. We have the short term economic crisis and Powershift just wasn’t a powerful enough message to knock the media out and show just how important it is.”

While media coverage for environmental issues increased immediately following Hurricane Katrina and the release of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, new issues have since come to the fore. Students at Powershift suggested that this means the public now pays less attention to science legislation than it used to — many said they viewed the event as a reminder for the US government and general public about this issue.

According to Clayton Munnings ’10, a participant in the Capitol Hill rally, “lobbying your government representative is the most persuasive way to make your voice heard. We’ve shown our representatives that we are serious, but to realize success we must remind them that we’ll vote on this issue by calling their office and setting up further meetings.” Munnings was confident about the role of such demonstrations in passing science legislation. “Hopefully through this democratic process, the politicians who are ‘non-believers’ will have to pay attention to this issue. The politicians on the fence will become believers and those that are believers will become champions.”

Prof. Jack Elliott, design and environmental analysis, stated his support for the goals Powershift set for the US government and public. In addition to slowing global climate change, he said, the nation could derive geopolitical benefits from adopting the new energy plan, such as energy independence from the Middle East.

“Even if [climate change] wasn’t human induced, all the things that people are advocating to ameliorate … would make the world a better place,” Elliott said. “We really have to design differently, live differently, think differently, consume differently.”

The Obama administration‘s new energy action plan included all of the goals advocated by Powershift, except the revision of its clean coal initiative.

"I think that these grassroots efforts are great and essential,” Fahey said, going on to explain that Powershift’s impact was unfortunately not so clear. “The political will of the country is 250 million people, its not just 100 senators and 250 congressmen and their staff. So if it doesn't make the media then it doesn't do much,” he said.

Students involved in the demonstration remained steadfast. “In the end, we’re fighting for our survival—it’s critical to convince politicians to join the fight,” Munnings said. “We can mitigate climate change with current technology — the key to success is gaining enough political will.”