Shawnee Group of the Sierra Club

10/09/2026

Please join the SCIL Mining Team, Tuesday October 13 at 6:30 pm on Zoom for Big Tech and the Pressure to Burn More Coal. At a time when we should be doing everything possible to reduce coal mining and the related environmental damage, the opposite is happening. This panel discussion will explore the connections between data centers and their need for a massive amounts of energy and pressure to burn more coal. Register here:

The rush to build data centers across the state is a significant threat to our clean energy goals. At a time when we should be ending the damaging act of extracting and burning coal, the demand for additional energy may lead to an expansion. Join our panel

09/29/2026

09/28/2026

Don't miss our Watch Party on Sept 29 at 5:00 PM! It is FREE!
Come by to visit with local environmental groups, join friends for a bite to eat before our keynote speaker, Bill McKibben. Bill's most recent book, Here Comes the Sun, is just the latest of his many environmental books over his activist/author life. REGISTER and attend the other sessions of this summit that runs Sept 28 - 29. REGISTRATION IS FREE! Come and enjoy the fellowship of our friends & neighbors.

09/26/2026

🌳 Volunteers needed, Carbondale! 🌳

📍 Fall Tree & Shrub Sale — Sat. Oct 3, 7am–2pm @ Downtown Square Pavilion
📍 Downtown Homecoming Cleanup — Sat. Oct 10, 9–10:30am @ Civic Center/City Hall

Help us keep Carbondale green and clean! All gloves, bags & grabbers provided.

📧 [email protected] | 📞 (618) 630-5323

09/24/2026

09/24/2026

Here are some photos from the Meet & Greet we held this past Sunday for Julie Fortier, the terrific candidate running in the US 12th Congressional District race against incumbent Mike Bost. As in the town halls she has held across the district, she made emphatically clear she believes in facts and transparency, cares about our interests, and will fight for them once she takes office in January 2027!

09/19/2026

The Shawnee Group received a question through FB Messenger about what the Sierra Club is. Since FB messenger can sometimes have tricky aspects to it, here's a start at an explanation through this post.

One important focus of the Sierra Club, particularly the Illinois Chapter and the 14 local volunteer groups in Illinois (Shawnee Group on among them) is to fight with others in the Illinois Clean Jobs Coalition to pass clean energy and clean energy jobs and grid legislation in the state legislature, with a push in Sierra Club to endorse and support once elected legislators that will help those bills become law, including the Climate & Equitable Jobs Act (2022--the Clean Jobs Hub in theCarbondale area is now on its third cohort for training solar installers and HVAC workers!), the Clean Reliable Grid Affordability Act (2025), and to be pushed this coming IL Veto session, the POWER Act (SB4013/HB5513), which would regulate and limit data centers and their use of community resources, water, energy, land.

The Shawnee Group newsletter lists our speakers series and hikes and initiatives. Here's the link to the fall 2026 issue:https://www.sierraclub.org/sites/default/files/2026-08/shawneetrailssept2026forweb.pdf I'll add in another comment a fact sheet for the Illinois POWER Act.

06/24/2026

Sunday July 12 at 10:00AM
Tunnel Hill Bike Ride
Join us at the Vienna Tunnel Hill trail head at 10:00 for an 18 mile ride. Bring your own bike and water. You must call Bob to register at 708-471-7500 in order to go on this outing!