Yesterday, after a meeting with CEO’s from the nation’s most innovative energy companies, President Barack Obama told reporters that the global warming legislation passed by the House last week and currently being debated in the Senate will create new clean energy jobs for America and reduce the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions.
The work of building a clean energy economy was begun in earnest with passage of the American Relief and Recovery Act earlier this year. The stimulus package is already creating green jobs, according to the President.
“I'm pleased to say that we've achieved more in the past few months to create a new clean energy economy than we had achieved in many decades before,” he told reporters gathered at the White House. “The recovery plan will double our country's supply of renewable energy, and is already creating new clean energy jobs.”
Obama went on to say that the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, the climate bill now awaiting a vote in the U.S. Senate, has the potential to create millions of new green jobs and curb global warming pollution.
“And last Friday, the House of Representatives passed an extraordinary piece of legislation that would make renewable energy the profitable kind of energy in America,” Obama went on to say. "It will reduce our dependence on foreign oil. It will prevent the worst consequences of climate change. And above all, it holds the promise of millions of new jobs -- jobs, by the way, that can't be outsourced.”
This article was contributed by The Green Jobs Report.
rate
email
print
link to this page
Comments: 24
I hope it does - we'll see how it all plays out.
(there's always surprises around every turn)
I imagine that the bill would create some green jobs. The right wing is horrified that it may get rid of some fossil fuel jobs at the same time. I am actually okay with that- because green jobs are future jobs and fossil fuel jobs are past jobs. We do not want to cling to the past. We want to embrace the future, not run from it as W did.
Chris, wake up.
It is not the loss of Fossil fuel jobs, but the lack of effective replacement jobs. Replacing 100,000 jobs with 200 jobs is not effective. Many of the right have no problem with reducing Pollution, which is more real than Global Warming. But they understand that the economy has to be rebuilt at the same time. Obama under Pelosi's instructions is doing just the opposet, they are taking the economy down further.
Jeez, Dan... There's an echo in here - from 1975! C'mon, man - most of the argument against the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act was, "We're gonna lose jobs." Sorry, it's about the environment. We'll have to take care of the jobs issue another way.
Two reports published in June help to debunk the myths that the right is circulating about green jobs.
The Pew Charitable Trust "The Clean Energy Economy: Repowering Jobs, Businesses and Investments Across America" provides new details about a rapidly growing clean energy sector that was comprised of 68,200 business and employing around 770,000 American workers as of 2007.
“The number of jobs in America’s emerging clean energy economy grew nearly two and a half times faster than overall jobs between 1998 and 2007,” according to Pew.
Another report issued by the Political Economy Research Institute and the Center for American Progress found that spending on clean energy through the American Relief and Recovery Act (the stimulus package) and the American Clean Energy and Security Act (the climate bill) will lead to a net increase of about 1.7 million jobs.
Ok Chuck, so we put how many people out of work, and then come back and in 20 years manage to put a fifth of them back to work. So what are we to do for them and with them until then?
No it has to be done at the same time. If we make this move, then we have to have a ready means to start creating jobs as soon as one starts dumping employes.
"There's an echo in here - from 1975"
Thank goodness for Toyota and Datsun, or they would have been right.
So can we expect the same savings as that time also? The thing is, if the idiots then had listened, they could have done the same thing without the job loss. But as usual, your group had to play know it all, and we had to rely on foreign companies to save us from you people.
David, this is for you.
"With more than half a million jobs at stake, the CERES compromise barely opens the hiring office. The lower energy efficiency targets may be strong enough to create 60,000 jobs. And with the renewable electricity standard almost completely gutted, it looks like all the new renewable energy jobs will be in the credit trading business."
http://blog.cleanenergy.org/2009/06/04/renewable-electricity-standard/
THis is from "Clean Energy.org, and they do not support nor agree with anything you are posting, except that Traders will have an open job market.
So far every time Obama opens his mouth about the Economy and Jobs, we loose more jobs, and the Economy takes another hit. So far, Obama's best effort would be to admit he is a fake and a fraud, then resign.
"The right wing is horrified that it may get rid of some fossil fuel jobs at the same time." And let me guess, they are horrified about stopping this!
Eric, Many consider me on the Right. I would love to get rid of fossil fuels. The idea of being able to drive 500-1000 miles on a tank of gas is great. Even better would be a car I could plug into my house wall outlets and never have to fill up again. But at the same time, I do not want to lose performance or safety from my vehicles, nor do i want to pay twice the savings for the price of the car.
What the Left refuses to acknowledge, is that none of the programs leads to any economic savings. Most hybrid cars would need to be driven for 20 years to realize the savings given the price increase. Also the Battery replacements are outrageously expensive. To make it work the savings need to be realize in 2-3 years or less. Also, the Left refuses to note that it uses more energy to manufacture a hybrid car, than is saved by its use.
Lastly, the right wants to buy energy efficient products because it makes economic sense, not because of some government mandate. We still believe in our freedom of choice.
Poliwonk, fair enough, but there are research initiatives underway to improve the battery technology, etc. but there are too many on your side of the fence who refuse to support said efforts. Things just don't happen overnight. The medium with which we are able to exchange words, debate, or whatever (meaning the Internet) is a prime example. Plenty of R & D dollars were spent on it, a significant percentage of which came from *drum roll* the "gubment". And now, decades later, plenty agree on how invaluable of a tool it is, for commerce, education... you name it!
So far everywhere this has been attempted, an average 2-4 jobs are being lost for evert 1 job created.
Where do you get this stuff? Jobs are being lost because the economy is in recession - no doubt in part because of the high gas prices of the past few years. Job loss is not being caused by green jobs or clean energy.
Yes, today we lose jobs. Batteries suck, and we need fossil-fired power plants to let plug-in technology work. But in 1963, a car got GOOD mileage if it made 20 mpg. Improving on that was gonna cost jobs, and it did... for a while. A first generation Prius cost three times its selling price to build. Today, there's a very small loss on every sale.
If you want to stop burning coal and gas to produce most of the electricity in the USA, I suggest you get your Reps and Senators on the horn and tell them to call the folks at Energy and tell 'em to fast track some nuclear plants. Solar panels and wind turbines just ain't gonna cut it, although they're a valuable part of the mix.
What we REALLY need is a space-based power station web, sending power down here through beam technology. But we're not even RESEARCHING that!
We need to learn to deal effectively with transition. Our economy is beginning to look like the computer model - remade every 18 months. We need to learn how to live like that.
We need Jobs, jobs, jobs, but not jobs that cost the lost of other jobs.
and who is behind the green jobs? American taxpayers. Who will benefit? Private companies. In the end, who got the discount?--it will be some rogue broker.....
Have you seen the latest on oil price s spiking because of?
Hemp is the answer, but many fates were stolen by the knife of the tyrants. This resource was stolen in the name of the textile industry. This is the greenest source of energy that God ever created. I would not believe all that we are being told by the puppet men.
"What we REALLY need is a space-based power station web, sending power down here through beam technology."
I think you have been standing in the beam to long and its fried your brain.
Here is the data I collected for my part in saving the environment and some ca$h in the process. I buy a $10,000 dollar wind turbine which pays for its self in 10 years max and the turbine has a life span of 30 years.
It sounds like the auto industry, I could trade it in for a newer more efficient model, mechanics can install and maintain it. It can be melted down to make next years model. Damn, I could go into the wind turbine biz.
Acording to Obama, unemployment would peak at 8%. Hmmm, it just hit 9% overall for the nation. Some states, like California, are much higher. I keep hearing about all these green jobs being created. Where are they? Where are the jobs from the sitmulus money? Not on this planet, Obama? As for all the people talking about dirty air and pollution, I guess you didn't grow up in the 60's and 70's. We had pollution then. The air is much cleaner now, in fact one theory says that the cleaner air has contributed to higher temperatures. Not that I am noticing any higher temperatures for the past 3 years, in fact it is downright chilly.
"We could see the first operational power satellite in about the 2020 time frame if we act now," said Miller, of the Space Frontier Foundation.
(S)atellites would electromagnetically beam gigawatts of solar energy back to ground-based receivers, where it would then be converted to electricity and transferred to power grids. And because in high Earth orbit, satellites are unaffected by the earth's shadow virtually 365 days a year, the floating power plants could provide round-the-clock clean, renewable electricity.
American scientist Peter Glaser introduced the idea of space solar power in 1968.
NASA and the United States Department of Energy studied the concept throughout the 1970s, concluding that although the technology was feasible, the price of putting it all together and sending it to outer space was not.
"The estimated cost of all of the infrastructure to build them in space was about $1 trillion," said John Mankins, a former NASA technologist and president of the Space Power Association. "It was an unimaginable amount of money."
NASA revisited space solar power with a so-called "Fresh Look" study in the mid-90s but the research lost momentum when the space agency decided it did not want to further pursue the technology, Mankins told CNN. By around 2002 the project was indefinitely shelved -- or so it seemed.
"The conditions are ripe for something to happen on space solar power," said Charles Miller, a director of the Space Frontier Foundation, a group promoting public access to space. "The environment is perfect for a new start."
And so has a 2007 report released by the Pentagon's National Security Space Office, encouraging the U.S. government to spearhead the development of space power systems.
"A single kilometer-wide band of geosynchronous Earth orbit experiences enough solar flux in one year to nearly equal the amount of energy contained within all known recoverable conventional oil reserves on Earth today," the report said.
The study also concluded that solar energy from satellites could provide power for global U.S. military operations and deliver energy to disaster areas and developing nations.
"The country that takes the lead on space solar power will be the energy-exporting country for the entire planet for the next few hundred years," Miller said.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/science/05/30/space.solar/index.html
Interesting stuff! Thanks for sharing this.