Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Kicks off Global Support For Live Earth

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa today showed his support for the Live Earth concert series and its global effort to raise awareness and seek solutions to the crisis of climate change by signing the 7-point Live Earth Pledge and lighting City landmarks green with a flip of a switch at the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP). As a national leader on the issue of climate change, Mayor Villaraigosa launched this campaign by officially lighting City Hall, the Griffith Park Observatory and the Los Angeles International Airport pillars green.

“In just a few days, cities around the world will come together in an unprecedented show of support for the effort to combat global warming,” Mayor Villaraigosa said. “In one voice, we will call on governments, corporations and individuals everywhere to join us in the fight to reverse the negative effects of climate change.”

The Live Earth Pledge, which calls for a 90% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050 and a comprehensive international treaty on global warming by 2009, among other climate change initiatives, was issued formally by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and Live Earth Founder Kevin Wall last Thursday. Live Earth is calling on people all over the world to sign the pledge and commit to making specific changes in their lives to tackle the crisis of climate change. The full pledge and Live Earth call to action is available at http://LiveEarth.org.

Villaraigosa was joined today by An Inconvenient Truth Producer Lawrence Bender, Actor and Environmental Activist Ed Beagley, Jr., LADWP Commission President David Nahai and Alliance for Climate Protection CEO Cathy Zoi.

Live Earth is a 24-hour, 7-continent series of concert events taking place on July 7, 2007. Led by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and founded by Control Room CEO Kevin Wall, Live Earth will bring together more than 100 music artists and 2 billion people to trigger a global movement to solve the climate crisis. The Live Earth concerts on July 7 mark the beginning of a multi-year campaign led by the Alliance for Climate Protection and other international organizations to drive individuals, corporations and governments to take action to solve global warming.

“The message of Live Earth is that the climate crisis is both critically urgent and something we can solve if all of us wake up and take meaningful action,” Zoi said. “Having the Mayor of Los Angeles join our movement and show leadership on this issue sends a powerful signal to the entire world at just the right time.”

Live Earth has experienced an outpouring of local support from cities and communities across the globe. Live Earth organizers also announced today that more than 7,000 ‘Friends of Live Earth’ events have now been registered in 129 countries and all 50 states. Friends of Live Earth is an official Live Earth program designed to enable individuals, groups and communities to host and attend events in support of the Live Earth message and build a worldwide community-level movement to combat the climate crisis. Live Earth expects the number of registered events to grow even larger in the lead up to the official Live Earth concerts on July 7, 2007. Through the Friends of Live Earth program, anyone, anywhere in the world can sign up to host an event in their community. People can also sign up to attend an event by searching for events in their area through the Friends of Live Earth Interactive Global Map. To host or find a registered event, visit: http://friendsofliveearth.org.

ABOUT LIVE EARTH
Live Earth is a monumental music event that will bring together more than 2 billion people on July 7, 2007 to combat the climate crisis. Live Earth will stage concerts in New York, London, Sydney, Tokyo, Shanghai, Rio de Janeiro, Johannesburg and Hamburg, and will feature more than 100 of the world’s best music acts – a mix of both legendary music acts like The Police, Genesis, Bon Jovi and Madonna with the latest headliners like Kanye West, Kelly Clarkson, Black Eyed Peas and Jack Johnson.
Live Earth’s 24 hours of music across 7 continents will deliver a worldwide call to action and the solutions necessary to answer that call. Live Earth marks the beginning of a multi-year campaign to drive individuals, corporations and governments to take action to solve the climate crisis. Live Earth is partnering with the Alliance for Climate Protection, The Climate Group, Stop Climate Chaos and other international organizations in this ongoing effort. Live Earth was founded by Kevin Wall, CEO of Control Room, the company producing the concerts globally. Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore is the Chair of the Alliance for Climate Protection and a Partner of Live Earth.
Exclusive online media partner MSN is helping Live Earth reach people in every corner of the globe. Official Live Earth concerts will be streamed live at http://liveearth.msn.com. MSN’s 39 localized web portals worldwide attract 465 million monthly users.

smart is the world’s only automaker serving as an Official Partner. Unlike any other vehicle, the new smart fortwo combines a modern, individual lifestyle with environmental protection by setting the standard in urban mobility and offering the lowest CO2 emission of any vehicle on the market. smart responds to environmental demands with innovative, technologically sound solutions and as a result produces positive and credible answers to the question of ecological driving.

Philips, as the world’s leading lighting supplier, joins Live Earth as an Official Partner. Philips was the first to introduce the energy saving light bulb in 1980 and has put environmental product improvement at the heart of its business with its EcoDesign program since 1994, increasing its green product range year by year.

Live Earth is partnering with companies on a local level who share the commitment to helping people live a more energy efficient lifestyle. PepsiCo, an Official Partner of Live Earth, is committed to making a difference with eco-friendlier packaging, energy and water conservation and waste reduction. It’s all part of PepsiCo’s commitment to Performance with Purpose — to do better by doing better. Esurance, the direct-to-consumer personal auto insurance company, joins Live Earth as an Official Sponsor and is the latest extension of Esurance’s efforts to conserve energy and preserve the planet’s precious resources. For more than seven years, Esurance policyholders have helped save thousands of trees by buying their auto insurance online and using electronic documents. An official partner of Live Earth, The Absolut Spirits Company, Inc., a subsidiary of V&S Group, produces and markets ABSOLUT® VODKA, Level ™ Vodka, FRÏS® Vodka , Plymouth™ Gin and Cruzan® Rum. The Absolut Spirits Company focuses on reducing the impact on climate change, sustainable agriculture and optimizing use of natural resources as mandated by V&S Group. To view details on the company’s efforts to combat global warming, visit www.vsgroup.com and click on “Corporate Responsibility/Environment.”

For more information, visit http://.liveearth.org or http://liveearth.msn.com.

About the Alliance for Climate Protection

The Alliance for Climate Protection is a 501c3 organization founded in 2006 by Gore, who is currently the Chairman of the Board of Directors. The Alliance is engaged in an unprecedented effort to convince people from all walks of life about the urgency and the solvability of the climate crisis.

Building on the momentum of the Academy Award winning film, “An Inconvenient Truth,” the Alliance’s objective is to engage individuals, communities, corporations and governments across the world to take action to quickly reduce their own greenhouse pollution to become “carbon neutral” and demand action from their political, business and community leaders to enact policies that will sharply reduce emissions.

Through an innovative combination of communication platforms and an influential collection of supporters that includes the environmental community, key leaders in business, the entertainment industry, the faith community, labor and many others, the Alliance will reach new audiences to engage them in solving the climate crisis.

Live Earth is the first major public project for the Alliance.