In the wake of BP more Americans are begininning to wake up to the terrible cost of our energy policies: degredation of Lousiana's bayous, destruction of ocean habitats, energy dependency, etc... Now, a fascinating piece in today's NY Times re Portugal's "leap" to renewable energy usage.
Five years ago, the leaders of this sun-scorched, wind-swept nation made a bet: To reduce Portugal’s dependence on imported fossil fuels, they embarked on an array of ambitious renewable energy projects — primarily harnessing the country’s wind and hydropower, but also its sunlight and ocean waves.
Today, Lisbon’s trendy bars, Porto’s factories and the Algarve’s glamorous resorts are powered substantially by clean energy. Nearly 45 percent of the electricity in Portugal’s grid will come from renewable sources this year, up from 17 percent just five years ago.
While it does make President Obama's goal of 25% by 2025 look a bit piddling, it underscores a larger issue in America's political system, one that Paul Krugman discussed yesterday in his column: the inability of our nation to invest in the infrastructure we need for our future.
These two issues are deeply connected, and the solution gets at ways to create good jobs that will help dig us out of this recession. In a previous era, American political leadership created good union jobs that built the energy infrastucture that made the mid-20th Century manufacturing economy take off; things like the Hoover Dam and the Tenessee Valley Authority.
We need a new national initiative to invest in our future in a way that will bring us out of our present. As Portugal's minister of economy and innovation notes:
ICCR, which has been around for 40 years, is an interfaith partnership to promote and facilitate socially responsible investing. It's a mostly Christian crowd, with two Jewish members: the Reform movement's pension fund, and Jewish Funds for Justice.
Laura Berry... is the executive director of an organization that bears that very idea in its name: the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility. It doesn’t accept that doing good and doing well have to be mutually exclusive at American companies, recent experience notwithstanding. If ever the corporate world could use a healthy infusion of responsibility, this would seem to be the time.
“We come at this issue from a moral perspective, but we also come at it as investors,” Ms. Berry said. “I actually believe that God, whatever God is, set up the system so that it works better when we don’t cheat.”
The core work of ICCR centers around proxy voting and social screening of investment decsions, but beyond that, as a collaborative and creative space for people of faith who manage money (like Jeffrey Dekro, President of our investment funds and an ICCR board member), it is also
Yesterday, the “Home Star Energy Retrofit Act” passed out of House Energy and Commerce Committee, bringing us one step closer to an exciting victory for workers and the environment. The vote earned some Republican support, received a special contratulations from the White House.
Jewish Funds for Justice has been organizing in support of Home Star for several months, leading the charge within the religious community. Yesterday we delivered a letter from 17 different faith institutions in support of the legislation. Signers included the Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life, the Episcopal Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of American, and many others. The letter begins:
We write to you as people of faith, on behalf of the communities, members and volunteers we represent. During these tough economic times, too many Americans are only one job or foreclosure away from poverty. Our common traditions command us to be good stewards of the earth and its people, and remind us of our shared responsibility to prevent harm to others and to take care of those in need. Transitioning to a clean energy economy can reduce our impact on the environment and provide economic opportunity for the most vulnerable among us. The proposed HOME STAR Program has the potential to do both of these things if crafted correctly.
Read the full letter below.
I attended the vote yesterday and delivered the letter personally to Congressman Peter Welch from VT, who is the lead sponsor on the bill, as well as Congressman Ed Markey of MA.
Special thanks are due to Green for All, and Representatives Bobby Rush and Barbara Lee who worked hard to ensure that the benefits of this and other clean energy initiatives will flow to all Americans.
Now the bil wil move to the full House of Respresentatives. We will be providing easy ways for the public to support this campaign, so stay tuned.
In response to the successes of new green technologies in the state and public pressure for job creation, the Colorado House this week passed a bill that would increase Colorado’s renewable energy standard (RES) to 30% by 2020.
There's new energy in town, and it's powering a boom that will make Colorado a leader in recovering from this financial downturn. This clean, renewable energy will grow Colorado's economy and lead to a brighter future.
There are key sections of [the bill] that will ensure that these RES jobs come with good wages, benefits and steady employment for Coloradans….
Requiring a third of our power to come from renewable sources is a great example of doing well by doing good. We will cut our carbon footprint, stabilize or even lower our energy costs, and remove pollutants from our air. We get all this while building opportunity for growing businesses and creating good jobs. That's a darned good deal.
The bill is awaiting Gov. Bill Ritter’s signature. Which state will be next?
Check out this great report from the Center for American Progress on the "Toolbest Recession". The report looks at how the recession has affected construction workers and manufacturing jobs, and outlines a plan for revitalizing this sector. Can you guess what they recommend? Cash for Caulkers, announced by President Obama earlier this week.
Yesterday, President Obama renewed his committment to the "Cash For Caulkers" program, more formally known as Homestar. This exciting program will offer American's rebates to retrofit their homes with energy efficient technology. If passed into law, it will create over 100,000 jobs, help Americans save millions of dollars on energy bills and decrease our impact on the environment.
However, with partisanship raging and an election looming, there might be a fight ahead for this program, and many like it. Jewish Funds for Justice believes these types of programs are critical to ensuring that our economicic recovery is green and equitable, creating good green jobs for everyday Americans, and we'll be tracking this policy and looking for ways to help.
Here are more details on the program from the White House below, we'll keep you posted.
Within the Washington DC bubble, it may can feel as if the fight for good green jobs is hitting serious roadblocks. The prospects of a federal climate and energy bill (a major vehicle for green jobs policy) is at best third on the Obama Administrations priority list. Pending jobs legislation may offers an opportunity to fight for good green jobs, but overall its a tough climate. But that doesn't mean we're not making progress.
Beyond the bubble of Washington, there is evidence every day that the clean energy economy is growing in a city near you. As part of its "Easy Being Green" series, the Center for American Progress released a study on the "Top Five Cities for Green Jobs" which highlights green jobs advances in San Francisco, Boston, New York City, Detroit and Portland Oregon.
Since creating our Just Green Jobs initiative, Jewish Funds for Justice has been working to leverage our programs to support a shift to the green economy. As a first step, we've partnered with Sustainable South Bronx to connect students on our service learning trips to their excellent work "Greening the Ghetto". In the coming months, we'll update you as we ramp up this program and offer more opportunities to create green economic opportunity in your community.
As JFSJ's gets more involved in the green jobs movement, equity and diversity are central priorities. The NRDC, which is a great organization doing important work, underscores (and perhaps exacerbates) the problem when it put up something like this.
Twelve examples of green jobs, only one held by a woman. Of the eleven men, ALL appear to be white guys.
I've become very interested in the movements around green jobs and a green economy. This video is a (very) brief intro to Van's thinking; i'll review his book when i'm done reading it. Curious to hear other recommended reading on the subject...
