About Us

History

The Global Warming Solutions Group was founded by members of the Heart of Illinois Sierra Club in order to focus on the challenge of adopting local solutions to this global problem. The group was organized by David Pittman and Kiersten Sheets in 2007 and has been meeting on a monthly basis ever since.  In that time, the group has grown in size and breadth and has been influential in many projects in central Illinois during this period.  Here are some of the group’s accomplishments:

• Convincing the Peoria City Council to adopt a revolving energy fund with the stimulus money received from the federal government that would create a fund to pay for future energy efficiency projects.  By creating this fund, it ensured that the City could have the opportunity to pay for projects without taking money from another source.
• When Peoria was looking at renewing the waste hauling contract, the group encouraged the contract to be improved with a free curbside recycling program.  GWSG hosted a “Mythbusters Recycling” public forum event at the Lakeview Library with all of the contract bidders in attendance.
• The group created an educational library display that has traveled to 20 unique public libraries in central Illinois to educate the public on global warming dangers and focusing on renewable energy and efficiency solutions.
• To further the education portion of the group’s mission, GWSG has hosted film showings of Kilowatt Ours, hosted a town hall meeting on global warming at Forest Park Nature Center, and has been teaching community education classes in central Illinois through entities such as the ICC Community Workshops.
• Members of our group have been privileged enough to serve on committees such as the Peoria County Sustainability Team, the City of Peoria Sustainability Commission, the planning committee for the ICC Green Expo, and the planning committee for the Natural Resources and Your Development Task Force that has been leading sustainability bus tours to feature projects around Illinois.

Mission

Global warming is a very real crisis of incredible dimensions. There is a proven connection between global warming and increased levels of greenhouse gases. Reduction of levels of CO2 and other greenhouse gases must occur as rapidly as possible.  We are a coalition of individuals and organizations dedicated to an 80% emissions reduction over the next 40 years. This reduction can be achieved through promoting energy efficiency and developing renewable energy sources.

To make the reduction a reality our group plans to:

• Publicize and garner political support for the Sierra Club’s Cool Cities initiative
• Encourage energy efficiency for homes and businesses as well as vehicle efficiency
• Encourage development of renewable energy sources such as wind, solar, and geothermal as alternatives to coal and nuclear.
• Educate the public about global warming, its consequences and effective responses
• Expanding the scope recycling in Central Illinois