Al Gore

Al Gore (Albert Arnold Gore Jr), who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001, is a politician and an environmentalist who has previously committed his efforts towards environmental issues. Since 1976, Al Gore has been active on matters touching the environment, with his climate change activism earning him the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 (Source).

Al Gore shared his Nobel Peace Prize with the IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change "for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change" (Source).

The Nobel Committee stated that there is a strong link between climate change and human security: "Global warming not only has negative consequences for human security, but can also fuel violence and conflict within and between states" (Source).

There are many good quotes from Al Gore.

Al Gore with book

Efforts as Politician

When he was first elected to the United States House of Representatives, Al Gore held the first congressional hearings on climate change and co-sponsored hearings regarding toxic waste and global warming (Source).

The Concord Monitor stated that Gore "was one of the first politicians to grasp the seriousness of climate change and to call for a reduction in emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases" (Source).

In 1990, he devised the Global Marshall Plan, a model that gave specific ideas on how to save the global environment (Source).

The plan focuses on the strategic goals, actions and programs that have the capability to remove the inhibitors that prevent the global economy from functioning efficiently. In addition, the plan required the wealthy and developed nations to allocate resources and environmentally-focused technologies to the Third World to help them in achieving stability in their populations and, at the same time, make economic progress. (Source). 

In the late 1990s, Al Gore supported and pushed for the Kyoto Protocol in the Senate, which is an international treaty committing nations into reducing the emission of greenhouse gasses (Source).

He also founded The Alliance for Climate Protection in 2006, an organization that seeks to provide solutions to climatic change (Source).

Al Gore speaking

An Inconvenient Truth

In 2006, An Inconvenient Truth was created, a documentary on the campaign of Al Gore that aimed to educate people about global warming. According to an estimate by Al Gore, he has presented the film to over a thousand audiences across the world. The film was created following a presentation by the then Vice President, which inspired many as he explained the critical nature of global warming (Source). 

In the film, Al Gore presented scientific data to support his argument that global warming is real, potentially catastrophic, and is caused by the consequences of the activities of human beings. The documentary achieved commercial success and won an Academy Award as the Best Documentary Feature in the 2007 award season. It also won the Oscar for Best Original Song with "I Need to Wake Up" by Melissa Etheridge. The commercial success of the documentary is compounded by the awareness it has created around the world concerning the issue of global warming (Source).

In an article from 2007, it stated that "An Inconvenient Truth" ranks as the United States' third-highest-grossing documentary ever, excluding concert films and Imax movies -- behind “Fahrenheit 9/11” and “March of the Penguins” (Source).

Al Gore at Cannes Film Festival

Climate Reality

Following the success of the film, Al Gore founded the Climate Reality Project, a non-profit organization involved in education and advocacy programs that are related to climate change. The focus of Climate Reality is to educate people on climate change and counter the campaigns that deny the realities of climate change across the world. The organization trains members of the public to give public talks and presentations on the harmful effects of climate change and ways to address climate change (Source). 

Climate Reality was created in 2011 as two groups merged, the Alliance for Climate Protection and the Climate Project, both of which were founded by Al Gore. Since 2011, it hosted 24 Hours of Reality and in 2013 it launched Reality Drop (Source).

Climate Reality Illustration

Al Gore - An Inspiration

The dedication of Al Gore to environmental issues is documented, both as an active politician, in official capacities as the Vice President, and as a person. Such commitment is a testament to the passion he has on the critical crisis of climate change. With such a precedent, more politicians, celebrities and everyone across the world ought to be motivated and campaign for awareness and play a role in adopting mechanisms that help in reducing the impact of human activities on the environment.

Al Gore Inspiration

Further Reading and Sources

Green Awakening

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