Film Shoot for Clean Energy
Film Shoot for Clean Energy
PennEnvironment Brings a Video Crew to My House and It Is Grand
This was another insanely hectic week, so that podcast I’ve been writing in my head about the connection between concrete climate actions and the deep work of cultural change will have to wait until next week.
Here’s a little of my online noodling—social media is often where I muse aloud:
What kept me very busy this week was the concrete work of shooting a video with a film crew from PennEnvironment — they’re promoting ways people can decarbonize with clean energy, especially how they’ve benefitted from the Federal Clean Energy Tax Credits. I was one of four people around Southwestern Pennsylvania they were interviewing and shooting video to put together a 3-minute piece (although there may be a separate piece about batteries because I had a lot to say about the uses of home backup batteries and EVs!).
PennEnvironment shared some preliminary images—here I am in front of my new native plant garden that just got planted!—including a picture of me with Metamorphosis, which coincidentally released on the day of the video shoot!
Check out the image gallery on PennEnvironment’s instagram post:
PennEnvironment is touring around the Pittsburgh area this week talking with folks who have gone solar, switched to electric vehicles, made energy efficiency upgrades, and more. These Pennsylvanians are helping to build a cleaner and greener world- and saving money at the same time!
First up, we visited the home of Susan Kaye Quinn (@skqbrightgreenfutures) who has solar panels, battery storage, electric vehicles, EV charging, improved insulation, an induction cooktop, and a native plant garden. Not only is all of this helping Susan clean up the air, do her part to fight climate change, and save money on her utility bills- she also got federal tax credits back for most of her clean energy and energy efficiency upgrades.
Thanks to Federal Clean Energy Tax Credits and Incentives available now- it has never been easier or more affordable to make the switch to clean energy. So Susan hopes more Pennsylvanians follow her lead and choose clean energy too!
But telling her story is not all she's doing to help folks envision a better, cleaner, healthier world. Susan is also a prolific author who writes, in part, about climate futures. And one of her short stories, "Seven Sisters," is available now in a new short story collection from @grist- Metamorphosis: Climate Fiction for a Better Future! So check out her stories and keep an eye out for videos about Susan's story coming soon!
If you want to see me being a big nerd on camera, check out this instagram post that was livestreamed from the photo shoot:
It was an amazing day, so creative and generative to talk about the clean energy upgrades I’ve done (and I got to gush about my personal native botanical garden, which I am in love with) while also using storytelling to create media that will hopefully be informative and persuasive for people trying to figure out how to go green (and use those tax credits to help!).
This was a great combination of concrete work and deeper cultural work, and it really got me thinking about the intersection of those. Often concrete work—physical actions like installing solar or planting a native garden—is compartmentalized from the storytelling about it. A lot of my time is spent in storytelling that’s not even in the present, like the film crew with me this week, weaving their narrative about things that had already happened, to inspire people to take similar actions. Hopeful climate fiction is all about the future, the world we want to live in but isn’t here yet. It’s the deep cultural work we need to change the world. And yet these very today-focused people were very interested in those stories as well and eager to talk about them.
I made sure everyone in the crew walked away with a copy of my short story collection, Halfway to Better. I would have given away copies of Metamorphosis, but I didn’t have them on hand! These are people already deep in the fight—they don’t need persuading, they need uplift, and these stories work for that as well.
I’ve been doing a lot of concrete work this last month and a half, and it’s brought home to me the power of that but also its integral connection with the deeper cultural work that is my passion. I’ll explore that in a podcast next week, but for now, I need to spend some time sitting with my plants and writing those stories of a better world.
