2008 Woodie Awards
Earth Day 2007: It's cool to be green
Tina Lam, Detroit Free Press (MCT)
Issue date: 4/25/07 Section: Life
There are still skeptics _ led by conservative talk show hosts like Rush Limbaugh _ but their numbers and power are dwindling.
Even ExxonMobil, an oil company that was funding global warming skeptics who create the impression that the science on climate change is iffy, has stopped funneling money to skeptics and says it's time to take action, said Andy Hoffman, a University of Michigan business school professor who studies business reaction to environmental issues.
He calls this the "third wave" of the environmental movement, following waves around 1970 and 1990.
"I think the growing scientific, social and political consensus is that global warming is real and has to be dealt with, and that's the driver of this third wave," Hoffman said.
Tim Solack, 51, likes working on cars, driving cars and working on his St. Clair Riverfront house in Marine City, Mich. He's a former factory worker turned firefighter. In November, he caught the environment bug.
"I've never been like this before," he said.
A battalion chief for the Redford Fire Department, he said he hadn't paid much attention to global warming until he watched Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Truth."
It seemed to answer his questions about why less ice was flowing in the river. And it inspired him to take vacation time and pay his own way last month to Nashville to become one of 1,000 people trained by Gore to spread the global warming gospel.
Now he's a crusader. Solack has helped promote a solar wind farm near an elementary school. He is an expert on melting ice shelves and thawing permafrost. He spends hours downloading scientific reports on the family computer, which he seldom used a year ago.
"My family is number one, but this comes next," he said.
Among his five sons, one supports him, but another warned him on his way to Nashville not to get brainwashed. Solack's wife wishes he would resume his work on the house. Fellow firefighters think he's crazy.
Even ExxonMobil, an oil company that was funding global warming skeptics who create the impression that the science on climate change is iffy, has stopped funneling money to skeptics and says it's time to take action, said Andy Hoffman, a University of Michigan business school professor who studies business reaction to environmental issues.
He calls this the "third wave" of the environmental movement, following waves around 1970 and 1990.
"I think the growing scientific, social and political consensus is that global warming is real and has to be dealt with, and that's the driver of this third wave," Hoffman said.
Tim Solack, 51, likes working on cars, driving cars and working on his St. Clair Riverfront house in Marine City, Mich. He's a former factory worker turned firefighter. In November, he caught the environment bug.
"I've never been like this before," he said.
A battalion chief for the Redford Fire Department, he said he hadn't paid much attention to global warming until he watched Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Truth."
It seemed to answer his questions about why less ice was flowing in the river. And it inspired him to take vacation time and pay his own way last month to Nashville to become one of 1,000 people trained by Gore to spread the global warming gospel.
Now he's a crusader. Solack has helped promote a solar wind farm near an elementary school. He is an expert on melting ice shelves and thawing permafrost. He spends hours downloading scientific reports on the family computer, which he seldom used a year ago.
"My family is number one, but this comes next," he said.
Among his five sons, one supports him, but another warned him on his way to Nashville not to get brainwashed. Solack's wife wishes he would resume his work on the house. Fellow firefighters think he's crazy.
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