Stories of people, climate, action and hope.
Climate change knows no boundaries. From our atmosphere and oceans, right down to birds and bugs and bacteria. Every living thing is interconnected, so harm caused in one place impacts all places. This theory of entanglement is big and beautiful and complex, and it recently became the legal basis of the argument lawyer Hollie Kerwin and her peers are using to gain legal protection for Australia’s natural wonders.
Read MoreFirst Nations peoples are intimately connected to Country and our knowledge and cultural practices hold solutions to the climate crisis. But since colonisation, Indigenous ways of knowing, doing and being have been ignored. Here’s what Groundswell is doing to change this.
Read MoreAs the climate crisis intensifies, so too does the language we use about the impacts of harmful human behaviour on the environment. But as Bundjalung and Worimi Saltwater woman Phoebe McIlwraith points out, human beings have a positive role to play in place, and that instead of focusing on our capacity to harm, we should recognise our interconnectedness with earth’s ecosystems and value our capacity to care.
Read MoreAlthough heatwaves cause more deaths than all other disasters combined, the stories of those living in debilitating heat are rarely told. As our summers become longer, hotter and drier, this is something Emma Bacon wants to change. She started Sweltering Cities to support communities lobby for more liveable, equitable and sustainable cities.
Read MoreIn January 2020 actor Yael Stone posted a video on Twitter announcing she was giving up her green card, which allowed her to work in the US, to stay in Australia and focus on climate change. Fast forward a few years and Yael’s launched Hi Neighbour, a community led energy transition project, which recently won a Groundswell grant.
Read MoreAs the oldest surviving culture on this planet, First Nations people are our original scientists and our most experienced caretakers. Over millennia they have cultivated a dedicated practice of nurturing the earth, as have our Torres Strait Islander and Pacific Islander neighbours. Given this truth, it makes absolute sense that in this critical climate decade we turn to their leadership and knowledge.
Read MoreWhen catastrophic bushfires drove Claire O’Rourke and her family from their home in early 2020, the lived reality of climate change sent her spiralling. Knowing she was not the only person feeling this way she wrote ‘Together We Can,’ a book about overcoming despair by reconnecting with your community and stepping into action.
Read MoreWhen it comes to climate change, a tipping point is something many of us are used to hearing in the same sentence as ice sheet disintegration, thawing permafrost and coral reef die off. All big, scary stuff. But a tipping point is neither positive nor negative. It’s when a relatively small thing happens that triggers a shift in the dynamics of a system, changing it from one state or way of operating to another.
Read More“As humans, we are slow to act to protect the environment from our own destruction, to halt its decline, to care for home, our golden earth. ‘On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing’ is a meditation on time.”
Read MoreWe don’t know about you, but May 21 is a night we’ll remember for some time. Huddled around the TV as election results rolled in, we went from feeling white-knuckled nervous, to cautiously optimistic, to hands-in-the-air excited. Because once the counting of votes started, it quickly became clear we were finally having the climate election we so desperately needed to have.
Read MoreWe caught up with Dr Amanda Cahill, CEO of The Next Economy, about her work mobilising leaders and communities across the Sunshine State towards a zero emissions future. The Next Economy won a $40,000 Groundswell grant in July 2021 for their project ‘Central Queensland Energy Futures’.
Read More“Every single person can help in some way with the immediate response to these floods. In the same way, every single politician in an elected leadership position has the opportunity to step up and be a leader on climate,” writes Anna Rose.
Read MoreIf you’re not a climate scientist or working for Greenpeace, is there anything you can do to curb the impacts of global warming? Absolutely. In fact, of all the lies that have been spread about climate change, perhaps the most harmful is that there is nothing you can do to help save the planet.
“Living within this ecological crisis, and waking up to it, feels like a kind of vertigo, like everything is spinning and moving and screaming and it’s hard to stay straight.”
Read MoreWe caught up with Warrick Jordan, Co-ordinator for Hunter Jobs Alliance, about his work helping to retain and grow Hunter based industrial jobs in the clean energy economy, as well as effective planning and investment to manage economic change. Hunter Jobs Alliance won a $40,000 Groundswell grant in July 2021.
Read MoreWe caught up with Groundswell member Tishiko King for a chat about her journey through life and work as a marine biologist, Seed Campaign Director, and proud Torres Strait Island woman.
Read MoreInside Young Henry’s brewery in Newtown there’s a fluorescent green glow pulsing from the bubbling bioreactors. It sounds like a scene from a science fiction film, but it’s actually an innovative commitment to the future of fighting climate.
Read MoreDressed in a beautiful emerald green pyjama set tailor made for her in Hoi An Vietnam, we spoke with Phebe about her love of art and learning, her family’s extraordinary journey escaping the Vietnam War, and the power of kindness and giving in daily life.
Read MoreGreg Mullins is a former commissioner of Fire and Rescue New South Wales, a Climate Councillor with the Climate Council, and the founder of Emergency Leaders for Climate Action. Here he reflects on 50 years of fire-fighting, the impact of climate change and his hopes for a better future for his grandchildren.
Read MoreThe Groundswell team was excited to learn about the launch of the First Nations Clean Energy Network, spearheaded by a group of First Nations cultural leaders including Karrina Nolan, Executive Director of Original Power and founding Advisor of Groundswell Giving. We caught up with their team to learn more about the project and what it will mean for First Nations communities across the country.
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