Against the Wind Screening -- Followed by Panel Discussion

Wednesday, October 22, 7-9 p.m. | Free | Screening: 7– 8 p.m. | Panel discussion: 8–9 p.m.
Fitzpatrick Auditorium, Sams Hall of Fine Arts

Kansas Wesleyan University, 100 Claflin Ave., Salina, KS 67401

Kansas Wesleyan University is partnering with the Climate + Energy Project to screen the video Against the Wind, which tells the story of the robust growth of the Kansas wind industry despite attacks by the state legislature. This is the sixth episode of a nine-part SHOWTIME® docu-series on climate change that premiered in spring 2013. Correspondent America Ferrera reports on how public policy has fostered the development of wind and solar power in Kansas, and how the oil and gas companies and their well-funded lobbyists and allies (like the Heartland Institute and the American Legislative Exchange Council) are influencing lawmakers to resist and repeal these policies.

In the video, Ferrera interviews Kansas rancher Pete Farrell and wind advocate Kimberly Gencur Svaty, both of whom will be present to participate in a panel discussion after the showing. Ferrell is a fourth-generation cattle rancher who is a true pioneer in wind energy in Kansas. His 7,000-acre ranch near Beaumont in south-central Kansas is home to the Elk River Wind Farm, one of the state’s first wind farms which opened in 2005. He has frequently spoken and testified in support of wind energy.

Watch a teaser clipof Ferrera interviewing Ferrell.

Svaty (Owner/Principle of Gencur Svaty Public Affairs, Topeka) is Public Policy and Advocacy Director in Kansas for The Wind Coalition. As a public relations consultant, she appreciates good public policy and has significant experience navigating and influencing the political process. She is a fifth-generation urban girl who married a fifth-generation farm boy.

In a second story line in this series episode, Ferrera investigates the battle over the future of renewable energy in the US and pierces the veil of the fossil fuel industry’s well-funded operation to try to dismantle state clean energy standards, which some people regard as repressive government mandates. In doing so, she profiles and confronts prominent climate skeptic James Taylor of the Heartland Institute, who crusades against clean energy in Kansas and across the country.

Watch a teaser clip.

In a third story line, columnist Mark Bittman of The New York Times discovers that extracting natural gas through fracking delays our transition to renewable energy, and that fracking wells leak a large amount of methane (a powerful greenhouse gas), making fracked natural gas as dirty as, or dirtier than, burning coal.

The Public Screening will be followed at 8 p.m. by a Panel Discussion, which includes Farrell and Svaty, as well as Dr. Johannes (Johan) Feddema, professor and chair of the KU Geography Department and contributor to the climate change assessment reports published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Geneva, Switzerland.

Against the Wind is Episode 6 of the groundbreaking 9-part docu-series about climate change entitled Years of Living Dangerously. This series was televised by SHOWTIME® last spring. When the series premiered in April 2013, Episode 1 was released to the public domain. It can be watched free online by linking to: http://action.lcv.org/site/PageNavigator/Years_Of_Living_Dangerously.html .

This Event is FREE AND OPEN to everyone.