On the one year anniversary of Obama’s election, the New York Times has run an article assessing Barack on some of the issues which have defined his presidency to date. One of the areas covered is Energy and Environment. The analysis is not very in-depth, divided into one paragraph about his campaign promises and one about the action he’s taken in office.
A headline atop the Energy and Environment section sums its contents and Obama’s record on the issue up nicely: “Some progress, but the big fight is still ahead.”
The American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) is a massive piece of legislation that leaves no stone unturned. It has a cap and trade provision; it provides billions of dollars for the development of clean electricity by harnessing the power of wind and sun, and it also includes funding — to the tune of $90 billion – to support an extensive energy efficiency program.
Ironically, while much attention has focused on the bill’s cap-and-trade provision, covered here, energy efficiency is the one provision in this ACES legislation that over the long-term could have the most impact in resolving the climate change issue.
Step 1: Reduce the Need for Energy
It’s true that building wind farms across the U.S. wind corridor or massive solar power plants in the western deserts sound like attractive propositions. However, they also generate their share of issues. …read more of Blogging ACES Pt. 2 - Energy Efficiency here
Barack Obama named his nominee to replace Justice David Souter on the United States Supreme Court today: Sonia Sotomayor, a U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judge in New York.
Sotomayor was appointed to the Federal District Court of Manhattan by the first President Bush and then promoted to the Court of Appeals by Clinton, leading Obama to praise her as a non-partisan nominee.
She studied at Princeton before attending Yale Law school. She is a first generation American who grew up in the Bronx, the daughter of a factory worker: seemingly the embodiment of the American Dream.
Big agribusiness was shaken a little over the Obama administration’s proposed cuts to farm subsidies.
The plan was to end direct payments to farms with more than $500,000 in gross sales. The cuts would save over $9 billion over a decade, and therefore is part of the administration’s overall budget plan.
The potential problem with this cut is that the $500,000 in sales may not take into account the amount that farms may actually spend to grow their yields, nor how much they make in profits.
There is a lot of excitement about the prospect of new green jobs, and rightfully so. President Obama has made it a priority in his administration and even hired Van Jones as Green Job Advisor to help make it happen.
But under the radar and excitement, and in response to all of the excitement about green jobs, there is some negative chatter concerning the “myths” of these jobs.
Recently, a collaborative report was written by law and economics professors at the University of Illinois arguing that the proposal of green job creation has many myths attached to it.
The paper postulates that these jobs will not really help the economy, and that they’ll also cause great harm and detriment to our society and to the industry’s growth and potential.
Stay current on the latest policies and progress government is making on addressing green issues. Find out what is going on off-camera and in the discussion chambers of government. Advocate your thoughts and ideas.
Ted is always looking for ways to minimize his ecological footprint. Professionally, Ted is working to gain the skills necessary to turn his passion for sustainable development into action, as an entrepreneur or financing sustainable businesses.
Ted studied economics and international business at Saint Louis University’s campus in Madrid, where he graduated Magna Cum Laude and was honored as the Distinguished Student in International Business for his class. As the founder and president of the SLU Madrid Business Club, Ted focused the club’s activities on sustainability.
While working for commercial real estate multi-national Jones Lang LaSalle’s Madrid office, Ted strove to implement sustainable practices both within the firm and for its clients. He proposed and designed an Environmental Sustainability Action Plan for JLL Spain. Green Building and Environmentally Sustainable Development remain a passion for Ted: he believes that the intersection of sustainable infrastructure and sustainable attitude is where we’ll find a sustainable society.
Ted currently works for a private equity firm in Madrid, learning skills that he hopes to apply to finance Environmentally Sustainable Development in the United States and around the world.
Tracy is the CEO and Founding Partner of Technical Green - a green industry career site focused on clean tech and green research and development.
Tracy's professional experience are in the recruitment advertising and non-profit sectors and she has for many years maintained a sustainable lifestyle.
Marie Oser is a best-selling author, columnist, and host/producer of VEG TV. A vegan lifestyle expert, and environmental advocate with a focus on nutrition and its role in disease prevention, Oser specializes in creating original gourmet recipes with a solid nutritional bottom line.
Many prominent medical and nutrition professionals endorse her work, including Dr. Colin Campbell, Professor Emeritus, Cornell University and principal researcher of the groundbreaking CHINA STUDY, and Neal Barnard, M.D. founder and president of Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine in Washington, DC.
Marie is president of VEGTV, Inc., a video production company producing content for TV and new media. VEGTV streams hundreds of lifestyle videos to more than 1,000 sites globally. In her role as Director of Product Development at Smart Planet Kitchen, she has created, Marie Oser’s Lean & Green, a new line of vegan and Fair Trade Certified products. Marie has appeared on CNN, ABC, National Public Radio, QVC, WUSA, WNBC, KCAL, KOVR, Home & Garden Television (HGTV), FINE LIVING, TECH TV, and Discovery Channel.
Vegetarian since 1971; vegan since 1990, Marie left a career in TV advertising to pursue her interest in food, health, and nutrition. Born and raised in Philadelphia, PA, she studied psychology at St. Joseph’s University. Marie is a gourmet cook and organic gardener living in California, writing her 5th book and hiking every day with Travis, her Yellow Lab companion.
Cherl Petso is the Associate Editor at Disaboom.com, an online magazine for people with disabilities. Her writing expertise includes articles about the environment and sustainable living, and vegan/vegetarian issues. A vegetarian for 16 years and a recent vegan, Cherl is passionate about animal rights and issues. She enjoys writing about simple ways to lessen the impact on the Earth.
Cherl recently moved to Denver, Colorado from Bellingham, Washington. She enjoys hiking and hanging out with her puppy.
Nathanial Manning works for the Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI) as a Regional Analyst for Asia. He focuses on two programs for CCI, the Green Building Retrofit program and the Waste Management program. Nathaniel recently graduated from Brown University as an Environmental Studies Masters student, specializing in sustainable design and international carbon policy. Nat also completed a Bachelor of Arts in World Religions at Brown, focusing on the philosophy of ethics and the intersection between religion and politics. He is completing his Masters thesis on clean-technology-transfer within the UN's carbon credit mechanism (the CDM), which allows developed countries to invest in carbon mitigating technologies in developing countries with the purpose of promoting sustainable development.
Nathaniel has a long history of involvement in environmental development work ranging from waste-to-energy entrepreneurial ventures to designing sustainable homes for the Guatemalan chapter of Habitat for Humanity, to working for a tidal energy engineering firm in Singapore. Nat's passion is in how intelligent innovative solutions and technologies can be applied to create a sustainable and free world. When Nat thinks of the word "green" he does not just think of the word "environment" but how we as humans can design systems and solutions that create win-win situations.
Robert Cowin is a political consultant for environmental NGOs. His nomadic childhood reveals a world-class carpetbagger, but he masks as a Texan-New Yorker hybrid. Formerly with the National Environmental Trust (now the Pew Environment Group) in DC, he’s spent time on Capital Hill advocating for Kyoto ratification, clean air, renewable energy technology, and green energy policy.
Robert has also worked on marine conservation issues, directing the Conserve Our Ocean Legacy coalition in the Mid-Atlantic States which successfully worked to help strengthen and reauthorize the Magnuson Steven’s Act. He now happily lives in Southern California, flying back east often as he finishes his Masters in International Relations at Tufts University’s Fletcher School.
Dayanti Karunaratne is a freelance journalist based in Canada's capital city, Ottawa.
Since graduating from Carleton University's journalism program in 2006, Karunaratne has worked on the news desk at the Port Hope Evening Guide, the Ottawa Citizen, and the Molokai Times. Karunaratne's writing appears in the Ottawa Citizen, Ottawa Magazine, the Globe and Mail, and other lifestyle publications.
Heather O'Neill is the founder of Eco to the People, a green living blog.
Before founding Eco to the People, Heather O’Neill wore so many hats in the field of journalism that even the Queen Mother would envy her collection. She has worked as the managing editor of a beauty trade magazine; as a copy editor for an online tech magazine; as the associate editor of a city magazine and as a newspaper reporter and columnist, and as the senior editor at the popular online newsletter ecofabulous.
Her work has appeared in many publications, including Parenting, Alternative Medicine, Natural Solutions, Marin Magazine, Greenwich Magazine and HOME.
Heather earned a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from California College of the Arts. She lives and works in San Francisco.
