CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) – With many worried about climate change on the global scale, activists in the area believe big change starts small.

That is what April’s Climate Cafe was all about.

Hosted every other month by the Community, Climate, Collaborative, or C3, in collaboration with Charlottesville and Albemarle County.

“Local action is important because the community can really come together and make a difference on a lot of decisions that are made,” said C3 organizer Sarah Delgado. “Our goal is to make net zero communities a reality.”

Delgado said C3 works to better the global climate from home. The climate cafes aim to put a spotlight on specific climate issues, inviting the community to the Bradbury to engage the community.

“We want to see fossil fuels go away there’s a lot of solutions that are out there that we can embrace, and so we can reduce the impacts of climate change,” Delgado said.

This month, energy was the focus and solar the proposed solution.

“Solar is a great renewable energy,” Solar Program Manager for Local Energy Alliance Program Deborah Arnestein said. “The sun is gonna always have energy for us to use.”

Arnestein believes big change starts with individual choices, such as the decision to attend the climate cafes and decision to switch to solar power.

“I think the climate conversation is certainly like on a huge global scale, but it’s also one person at a time. Making sure that your homes are energy efficient,” Arnestein said. “That they might be getting solar on their own.”

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