Thursday
Feb052009
Economic stimulus will reduce at least 61 million tons of CO2 every year
Thursday, February 5, 2009 at 1:26PM
Greenpeace research on the economic stimulus plan as proposed by President Obama revealed promising results for the environment and economy. In a press conference today, Steven Biel, Greenpeace's global warming campaign director, stated, "We strongly support the legislation and we urge congress to pass it."
Kurt Davies, Greenpeace research director, explained how the energy and transport portions of this legislation are projected to fight global warming. "Taken together, they will cut at least 61 million tons of CO2 every year. That's the equivalent of taking 13 million cars off the road and equal to the electricity from about 7.9 million American homes, about 8 times the size of Chicago."
Furthermore, Greenpeace focused on how spending money on clean energy will create jobs. Research from the University of Massachusetts has found that investments in transit will create four times the amount of jobs when compared to investments in oil. Investments in efficiency are projected to produce at least twice as many jobs as investments in coal.
Beil concluded, "The job creating potential and environmental benefits of clean energy is virtually limitless, we would urge congress, if anything, to put additional investments into these programs."
Kurt Davies, Greenpeace research director, explained how the energy and transport portions of this legislation are projected to fight global warming. "Taken together, they will cut at least 61 million tons of CO2 every year. That's the equivalent of taking 13 million cars off the road and equal to the electricity from about 7.9 million American homes, about 8 times the size of Chicago."
Furthermore, Greenpeace focused on how spending money on clean energy will create jobs. Research from the University of Massachusetts has found that investments in transit will create four times the amount of jobs when compared to investments in oil. Investments in efficiency are projected to produce at least twice as many jobs as investments in coal.
Beil concluded, "The job creating potential and environmental benefits of clean energy is virtually limitless, we would urge congress, if anything, to put additional investments into these programs."
Group endeavors hopes to help planet and people
Green for All and the Service Employees International Union converged in Washington, D.C. today, recommending to lawmakers how they should act following draft legislation recently put forward by Senate Democrats to introduce the Climate Equity Alliance, which is an alliance pushing for strong climate legislation that protects and provides opportunity for low- and moderate-income communities.
Jason Walsh, National Policy Director at Green for All said that, based on shared values, more than two dozen organizations from the research, advocacy, faith-based, labor and civil rights communities have formed this alliance.
“The urgent need of transition to a clean energy economy presents us with some critical choices…. We should therefore approach climate policy not only as environmental policy, though it is certainly that, but also as economic policy and as civil-rights policy that can advance principles of fairness and opportunity and equal access,” said Walsh.
The alliance believes that the best way to advance those principles “is to ensure that the strong policies needed to reduce green house gas emissions, also protect low and moderate income households and expand economic opportunity,” Walsh said.
U.S. climate policy needs to include effective mechanisms that reach all low-income households and effectively offset cost increases and to ensure that quality of life for those families is maintained, said Robert Greenstein, Executive Director at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
“This is definitely doable as part of climate legislation,” Greenstein said. “One certainly doesn’t want climate policy to have the unintended side effect of increasing poverty and hardship... Well-designed climate policy can assure that there aren’t such adverse effects by auctioning emissions allowances and devoting an appropriate portion of the proceeds to effectively deliver consumer relief for low and moderate income households”.
Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, CEO of Green for All, said “We believe that if climate policy can fight pollution, it can also alleviate poverty at the same time,” adding that she wants to make ensure that the alliance is equitable and takes in account low and moderate-income communities.
“We want to ensure that climate policies provide equal protection and also equal opportunity for all communities,” she said. “Our hope is that working together, if we do this right, we’ll really be able to make sure that both our planet and the people that inhabit it are not really just surviving but in fact thriving in a clean energy economy.”