Monica Gilchrist and Mary Luevano, Global Green USA, photographed in Santa Monica California, July 20, 2006

A few blocks from the Pacific Ocean, on Main Street in Santa Monica, California, is the Green Building Resource Center run by Global Green USA, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to greening the planet in a variety of ways, including working on "green building" for cities and schools, climate change and energy, water, weapons of mass destruction, and recycling, and operating a "Green Building Resource Center."

The group is enjoying increased prominence due to efforts by well-known Hollywood celebrity Brad Pitt to help it achieve increased prominence, especially through his and its mutual involvement in plans to re-build the Katrina-devastated City of New Orleans and the rest of the affected Gulf Coast in a greener and more sustainable way than it was before, through his sponsorship and organizing of a "Sustainable Design Competition for New Orleans."

Global Green USA originated as the U.S. branch of Green Cross International, an organization founded in 1993 by former President Mikhail Gorbachev of the former Soviet Union, following his experience of the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Former Soviet President Gorbachev recently proposed to the G8 Summit meeting in St. Petersburg, Russia, that it observe the 20th anniversary of the world's worst nuclear accident, Chernobyl, by creating a $50 billion global solar energy fund and reducing subsidies to the oil and nuclear industries.