Earth Day Organizers Hope for 'A Billion Acts of Green'

Tomorrow is Earth Day, and environmental groups around the world are hoping to get the world's populace moving – at least a little bit – to do something that makes a difference, even if it's only for one day. In an effort dubbed ‘A Billion Acts of Green’, Earth Day organizers are hoping to encourage people to observe Earth Day 2011 by pledging online at act.earthday.org/ to do something small but sustainable in their own lives to improve the planet's health, things like switching to compact fluorescent light (CFL) bulbs from energy-intensive incandescent bulbs or reducing the use of pesticides and other toxic chemicals.

“Millions of people doing small, individual acts can add up to real change,” said Chad Chitwood, a spokesman for the umbrella group that is coordinating efforts.

There will be hundreds of rallies, workshops and other events around the U.S. (the birthplace of April 22 as Earth Day) and hundreds more overseas, where the holiday is now celebrated in 192 countries.

In the U.S., the more visible planned activities will range from the premiere of the new film from the director of “Who Killed the Electric Car?” (it's called “Revenge of the Electric Car”) at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York to a discussion about creating a green economy in 12 cities along the Gulf Coast, where this time last year residents were reeling from the effects of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

In the years since the first Earth Day was celebrated in 1970, the environmentalist movement made great strides with passage of the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act and other groundbreaking laws.

But the bipartisanship that marked the birth of Earth Day -- it was sponsored in Congress by a Wisconsin Democrat named Gaylord Nelson and a California Republican named Pete McCloskey -- is often missing in discussions about environmental policy today.

Efforts to fight climate change by regulating greenhouse gases, for instance, face fierce resistance from many Republicans and members of the business community, who dispute the science that supports global warming, and warn new rules to regulate emissions will kill jobs and raise energy costs.