Clean Energy
WSJ: "Waxman-Markey's benefits far outweigh costs"
Published September 08, 2009 @ 02:14PM PT
A non-partisan new analysis of the Waxman-Markey clean energy and climate bill finds that it will have economic benefits that will be worth at least twice as much, if not more, than what it will cost.
“From almost any perspective and under almost any assumption, H.R. 2454 is a good investment for the United States to make in our own economic future and in the future of the planet,” concludes "The Other Side of the Coin", which was produced by the NYU Law School’s Institute for Policy Integrity.
How did the authors tote up the legislation's economic benefits?
As Keith Johnson of the WSJ's Environmental Capital blog writes today, the paper examines the "social cost of carbon:" what a ton of carbon is worth to our society when it isn't in the atmosphere, contributing to climate change's effects on the environment, the economy, public health, and national security.
Multiple federal agencies have accepted the estimate that a ton of carbon-not-emitted is worth about $19.
So using the bill's targets for how many tons of atmospheric carbon it will avert over the next forty years, the NYU Law analysts calculated that Waxman-Markey would be worth around $1.5 trillion on average.
Since bill's costs will add up to around $660 billion, that is a two-to-one return on the dollar. And this, according to the authors, is a conservative estimate, partly because it does not factor in many ancillary social benefits of cutting greenhouse gas pollution, such as "reduced ocean acidification, increased forest preservation, and reductions in local air pollutants such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, and particulate matter."
What Is a Green-Collar Job?
Published September 07, 2009 @ 04:19PM PT
"Green-collar jobs" have become a daily facet of the national conversation on energy policy, as well as economic revival. At the most fundamental, these are jobs that link rapid decarbonization of the nation's energy economy, with reviving the nation's eviscerated manufacturing base.
Here's how Apollo Alliance chair Phil Angelides defined green-collar jobs to Time Magazine last year:
It has to pay decent wages and benefits that can support a family. It has to be part of a real career path, with upward mobility. And it needs to reduce waste and pollution and benefit the environment.
The green jobs vision is creating some refreshing new advocacy partnerships, like the Blue Green Alliance, a joint effort of environmental groups and labor unions.
And it's not a particularly partisan issue -- or at least it wasn't a few years ago. The expansion of the green-collar jobs sector got its first major federal boost in 2007, with the passage of the Green Jobs Act, as Title X of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007.
Ohio Enviros Dress as Cavemen to Protest GOP's "Stone Age" Energy Stand
Published September 03, 2009 @ 08:25PM PT
Above: Highly amusing video by Bring Ohio Back about the Stone Age 5 -- GOP representatives who oppose the ACES energy and climate bill.
House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio), an avid opponent of federal climate and clean energy policy reform, got a special welcome yesterday from constituents dressed as cavemen to protest "stone age" GOP energy policies.
Or as the group Environment Ohio puts it, "backpedaling, coal- and oil- promoting alternative to the historic clean energy legislation finally being considered in Congress."
The occasion was a panel discussion in Columbus, where Rep. Boehner was joined by Rep. Steve Austria (R-Beavercreek), Bob Latta (R-Bowling Green), Pat Tiberi (R-Columbus) and Jean Schmidt, (R-Loveland). The five legislators appeared before the public to discuss the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES), which passed the House in June; most House Republicans voted against the bill. The public was not invited to comment at the hearing, which according to a local TV station, also featured several invited speakers who supported the Republican position.
Outside the meeting, around 60 protestors from Environment Ohio dressed up as cavemen to protest the GOP's prehistoric energy policies. “We think we need clean energy tax credits, clean energy programs, programs that will drive innovation in wind, solar, geothermal and other clean, renewable energy resources,“ Amy Gomberg of Environment Ohio told NBC 4 Columbus. “We’re suggesting we need to shift our energy policies to actually get us on a path to a clean, sustainable and renewable energy future,“ Gomberg said.
Duke Energy Quits Coal Group Over Its Opposition to Climate Action
Published September 02, 2009 @ 07:01PM PT
Above: Pro-coal lobby's "Clean Coal Carolers" campaign was last December's Christmas jeer.
Major electric utility Duke Energy has left a prominent coal industry lobby group over the group's opposition to climate change action. But some critics wonder why its CEO is still involved with another business group that's determined to derail energy policy reform.
Citing disagreements with "influential member companies who will not support passing climate change legislation in 2009 or 2010," Charlotte, N.C.-based Duke yesterday announced that it would drop out of the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, reports the National Journal.
Duke Energy's move has cheered prominent voices in the climate change blogosphere, but only to a point.
Street Art as Solar-powered Biofuel Generator
Published September 02, 2009 @ 03:57PM PT
From vertical farms to solar forests, neutralizing the carbon footprint of urban centers is one of the most popular trends in design.
Los Angeles firm Emergent Architecture has come up with a concept that combines public art with creating biofuel. Called a "photobioreactor," the aquarium-like structure would contain green algae colonies, also known as pond scum, which produce an oil that can be processed into a biodiesel fuel that can replace petroleum-based diesel fuel.
Even better, green algae consumes carbon dioxide, which is the leading driver of human-propelled global warming.
The system would use "tuned LED lights which vary in color and intensity to support algae growth at different stages of development, maximizing output," according to Emergent. (I'm not quite sure what this means, but suspect it has something to do with recent developments in using nano-materials to create LEDs that surpass their conventional cousins in the colors of light they can produce.)
A thin-film solar array strung into the branches of nearby street trees would collect energy during the day; stored in batteries, it would power the bioreactor's systems at night.
The firm has imagined a Los Angeles-based installation of bioreactors into the sides of buildings, as well as a public art piece for a Perth, Australia involving freestanding bioreactors built to evoke the shapes of cellular structures.
Rather than just stand and symbolize something, say the designers, the installation would also be doing something useful: using and creating clean energy. "Now, one could argue that artwork shouldn't actually do work," they acknowledge. But "if this decade in human civilization has presented us with any resonant knowledge about our world, it is that energy is culturally precious, that it is possibly the ultimate medium.
"Energy may indeed be one of the most timely mediums for art."
Image via Emergent Architecture
Via Solar Feeds
Youth Activists to Obama: No more Katrinas, restore Gulf Coast
Published August 27, 2009 @ 07:09PM PT
Above: "International climate activists floated two roof tops in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool early Thursday afternoon in anticipation of the fourth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina."
Related action: Tell the President: Lead Congress to Pass a Strong Clean Energy Bill
Just a few days before the fourth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's landfall on the Gulf Coast, youth activists today floated mock rooftops in one of Washington, DC's signature water landmarks. "HELP-The Water Is Rising" was the message painted on one of the roofs, while the 30-foot banner the protestors held up urged President Obama to "Prevent the Next Katrina, Restore the Gulf, Stop Global Warming."
The protest evoked memories of TV images that held the nation transfixed four years ago, of homes of New Orleans underwater after the city's levees burst in the hurricane's wake.
A statement from the activists calls for "bold US leadership at the UN climate negotiations in Copenhagen this December to pass a fair, ambitious, and binding global treaty that will prevent environmental disasters of the catastrophic magnitude of Katrina in the future."
Such a treaty, say the activists, will include financial support for developing nations that are simultaneously most at risk from the impacts of global warming, and least prepared to mitigate or protect themselves from them.
Close to two thousand people died on the Gulf Coast as a result of Hurricane Katrina; hundreds are still listed as missing. The storm also caused $80 billion in damages.
In New Orleans, the 1,400 or so deaths were not a direct consequence of the storm: the collapse of the levees was a human-caused disaster.
A coalition of 17 advocacy groups has also marked the approaching anniversary, calling upon the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to fulfill President Obama's campaign pledge "to restore nature's barriers -- the wetlands, marshes and barrier islands that can take the first blows and protect the people of the Gulf Coast."
President Obama, meanwhile, has responded to continued criticism of the Corps' work in the Gulf since Katrina by establishing a federal interagency task force to manage restoration of the Louisiana and Mississippi coastlines.
Senator Kennedy, Dead at 77, Was Champion for Clean Energy, Energy Efficiency
Published August 26, 2009 @ 12:11PM PT
Above: President Barack Obama and Senator Ted Kennedy walk on the grounds of the White House. White House Photo, Pete Souza, 4/28/09
Related action: Complete Kennedy's Unfinished Work -- Pass Health Reform
Senator Edward Kennedy died late last night, at age 77, after a 15-month bout with brain cancer.
The "lion of the Senate" is justly being praised today for his decades of effort to improving health care for all Americans -- not a surprise, given that his Democratic colleagues in Congress and President Obama, his chosen torch bearer for the future of Kennedy-brand American liberal reform, are locked in a battle to overhaul America's health care system.
But Senator Kennedy was also a strong, influential advocate for the environment, energy efficiency, renewable energy, and energy industry reform. Just a few of his long list of accomplishments include:
Cosponsoring the first law to establish fuel economy standards over 30 years ago, and in 2007, supporting stronger fuel economy standards, which will in turn help cut the nation's greenhouse gas pollution.
Sponsoring the "Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Act of 2000," to compensate men and women who, while working on national defense, were often unknowingly exposed to radiation and other toxic substances, as well as their survivors.
In 1975, pushing to end an "oil depletion allowance," which for several decades had allowed oil producers to exclude 22 percent of their enormous revenues from any taxes. Kennedy’s initiative lowered the allowance for independent producers, and ended it for the major oil companies.
Sponsoring the “America COMPETES Act of 2007,” which established an Advanced Research Projects Authority at the Department of Energy to be the focal point of federal efforts to support breakthrough research on new clean energy technologies.
Long-time support of renewable energy funding and programs, including the weatherization assistance program and the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program that helps low-income families reduce their energy bills by improving home energy efficiency.
Ted Kennedy is a singular example of someone who could have kicked back and coasted through life, but chose instead to help others. He was born into a position of social and financial privilege. The violent deaths of his brothers Jack and Robert gave them center stage in America's Kennedy mythology, and could have sucked a lesser character forever into stasis and regret.
Kennedy focused outward instead, on serving those who had less than he did, and needed help more. Publicly, he moved through his own disappointments, personal mistakes, and his family's terrible losses, to achieve a 46-year Senate career of steady liberal accomplishment and constructive leadership.
(Compare Kennedy's lifelong class act and embrace of responsibility for others, under intense public scrutiny and personal loss, to former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's regular offloadings of blame onto anyone and anything for her political and personal setbacks, her extremist us-vs-them political philosophy, and her cynical political gaming with the nation's energy policy and climate future.)
Senator Kennedy took his advantages, and perhaps the tragedies as well, and turned them toward being one person who could change the lives of many for the better. Losing him is surely an incalculable grief for his family. But hopefully it will move a new generation, equally devoted to changing the world for the better, to fill the void he's left in American politics.
