This imbalance is trivial when it comes to me, but very significant in the larger scale when we think about changing the American economy in a "green" direction. For example, as the New York Times reported on February 21, 2008, and as President Obama mentioned in his February 24, 2009 speech to the joint session of Congress, many of the solar panels and wind turbine parts that we need to move to a clean energy economy are made overseas. So is the battery for the much-touted all-electric Chevrolet Volt. And it's not price that is driving these sourcing decisions - rather, it's the regrettable fact that American industry doesn't have the capacity to make what's needed.
It doesn't have to be this way. There is no reason that American workers can't make these products in American factories. There is no reason that the billions of dollars that the federal government is spending on economic stimulus can't help fund green industry startups, instead of merely providing tax breaks every couple of years.
Locally, NRDC endorses Los Angeles Measure B, which, proposes to install 400 megawatts of solar panels in LA and is estimated to create tens of thousands of new jobs. In addition, the ballot measure calls for a bid preference for local manufacturers of solar panels. This provision to buy from local manufacturers, if implemented nationally, could bring us much closer to a green economy than the loose language in the federal stimulus bill that waives any "Buy American" restrictions if "the relevant manufactured goods are not produced in the United States in sufficient and reasonably available quantities."
Well, a rule that says you have to buy stuff here, unless it isn't made here, and it's not, would be a joke if it came from the lips of Howdy Doody. But there's nothing funny about it in today's economy. Let's follow the lead of the City of Los Angeles and make "Made in the U.S.A." a flag of pride again.
]]>What he means by that (I think) is that we have an opportunity now to move our society away from policies that have brought us global warming and the worst economy since the 1930s, and towards a green, sustainable, high-employment future. That opportunity was the topic of today's speakers at the Good Jobs, Green Jobs conference in Washington, D.C.
This morning I attended a workshop on the reauthorization of the surface transportation bill, known to transpo wonks as "T4." This is a multi-billion dollar piece of legislation that, as one speaker said, has historically been considered a trophy item for the highway lobby.
But no more. Now, as my colleague Deron Lovaas pointed out, we have an unprecedented opportunity to use federal dollars to build out public transit within cities and rail links between cities - instead of just laying down more asphalt. Deron said that, in the U.S., we have 44 auto trips for every transit trip (as opposed to 7 to 1 in Canada). Thus, there is huge leverage available to cut down on auto traffic, and the carbon emissions that cars produce, by investing in public transit. The same Congress will be debating T4 and the new climate change bill; Deron and others at NRDC will help them make the connection between the two.
In the plenary sessions, Senator Stabenow of Michigan spoke about how the manufacture of wind turbine parts and solar panels in the U.S. can bring American manufacturing back to life. Senator Klobuchar of Minnesota wants to see Rosie the Riveter making wind turbines; she pointed out that that the new energy technology economy won't be concentrated in one area, as in Silicon Valley for the information technology industry, but will be spread throughout the country wherever there is manufacturing capacity. Teamster General President Hoffa was on the same page: solar panels, hydroelectric generators, and wind turbines should be union-made in America. "It doesn't do us any good to buy the hardware from China."
In the afternoon, I was on a panel with Jeff Farmer (our moderator) and Fred McLuckie from the Teamsters, John Krieger from U.S. PIRG, and Ingrid Matthaus-Maier, the former CEO of a huge German economic development bank. We had probably the longest title of any workshop here: "Ensuring Sustainable Movement of People and Parcels - Taking the High Road Towards Transportation Infrastructure." Huh? Anyhow, we had a full house for our session.
John led off with an overview of the fast-changing status of the economic recovery bill in the Senate. As of this writing, the Senate is in a late-night session debating the many amendments. One problem that John noted is that the bill is heavily weighted towards highway projects, at the expense of public transit.
I followed John and talked about NRDC's work at the LA ports, and how that work can be duplicated nationwide to clean up dirty ports while creating good, well-paying jobs. In my view, an environmental remedy has to be economically sustainable in order to work, and that is precisely why NRDC supports the Port of LA Clean Trucks plan, as I've pointed out many times in my blog posts. I also talked about the new jobs that will be created manufacturing new, clean diesel trucks, retrofit kits for older trucks, electric drayage trucks and, some day, electric long-haul trucks, and in the renewable power industry that we will need to support those vehicles.
Ingrid followed me and gave a fascinating talk about how her development bank, KfWBankengruppe, works. It is backed by the German government, not taxed, and does not distribute profits. These facts allow it to borrow cheaply in the capital markets and loan more cheaply than commercial banks. It has loaned many billions of euros to support renewable energy facilities, green housing development, commuter trains, bicycle lanes, and even heavy rolling stock that beats current government standards. It has been wildly successful and is not a basket case like so many U.S. financial institutions.
Fred finished the session by talking about the Teamsters' view of the economic recovery bill and T4. He recognized (as I did) that the recovery bill is unlikely to get us "where we want 'em" on greening our transportation infrastructure and creating good jobs. But we are both hopeful that, working together, we can get 'em there on T4. If not now, then when?
]]>Wednesday afternoon I attended two workshops: building a sustainable supply chain, and state and regional climate policy. The former featured two speakers with whom the NRDC Southern California Air Team works with on a daily basis: Candice Kim of the Coalition for Clean Air, and Patricia Castellanos of the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy. They talked to a standing room only crowd about the health issues created by diesel-powered goods movement (Candice) and the labor/enviro/community coalition that pressured the City of Los Angeles to enact the most progressive port trucking cleanup plan in the country (Paty). Bama Athreya from the International Labor Rights Forum gave a moving talk about the labor and social justice issues involved in supplying goods to consumers in the U.S., including a chilling story of young women in Chinese compact fluorescent light factories in China being exposed to barrels of mercury.
Speaking of the L.A. port plan, oral argument in the Ninth Circuit in the American Trucking Association case against the L.A. and Long Beach ports has been set for March 4, 2009 in Pasadena.
The speakers at the climate policy workshop talked to another SRO crowd about the policies and status of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), the Midwest Greenhouse Gas Reduction Accord, and the Western Climate Initiative (WCI). California is a member of the latter. Two speakers from the AFL-CIO talked about the labor perspective on the WCI. They said that labor was not invited to the table, despite the effect that implementation of the WCI will have on working people. They criticized the WCI for not considering capital flight and de-industrialization, and for being wimpy and ineffective because it allows too many offsets and does not require 100% auction of allowances; many in the enviro community feel the same way. They recognized U.S. industry's claims of competitive disadvantage if it is subject to carbon caps but international competitors are not, and proposed a simple solution: a carbon tariff on imported energy or goods to level the economic playing field.
One of the AFL-CIO speakers reminded the audience of a remark we heard during one of the plenary sessions: "everybody does better when everybody does better." The central idea of this conference is that labor and the environmental movement are linked in trying to do better.
]]>As NRDC's Peter Lehner pointed out during today's session, our economic system is part of the world's ecosystem, and both are in trouble now. Creating low-wage, dead-end jobs are not the answer to spur innovation and energize our economy. Larry Cohen, president of the Communication Workers of America also made the point this morning that even "slaves have jobs." The plenary session today focuses on how to create long-term, economically viable green jobs across all sectors of our economy.
The figures for potential job creation in a green economy are impressive. For example, if we, as a nation, adopt a 70 percent recycling standard, there will be 1 million new jobs. The wind energy industry needs the skills of machinists and technicians from the old economy. One way to assure that these will be decent jobs would be to adopt a requirement that companies that take advantage of renewable energy tax credits or grants be subject to the Davis-Bacon prevailing wage requirement.
Achim Steiner, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme, said that environmentalism in the 21st century isn't just about cleaning up other peoples' messes. It's about how we move forward in an economically sustainable way to fight global warming and other environmental problems.
NRDC has a long history of working with labor - a history that continues to this day with our partnership with the Teamsters to clean up the port of Los Angeles with an economic model of port trucking to insure that new, clean, well-maintained trucks replace the old, dirty trucks we now see at the ports. As Peter said this morning, this model will also allow the Teamsters to try to organize the port drivers. We don't run away from that - we embrace it. Why? Because good jobs and green jobs are not mutually exclusive. We can have it both ways.
]]>The conference could not be more timely given the pace at which Congress is working on the stimulus package proposed by the Obama administration. Also, today's New York Times has a thought-provoking article on tough economic times in the renewables industry.
A friend of mine likes to say that trouble is opportunity in work clothes. As NRDC and others have pointed out, we have an opportunity right now to make a huge investment in a future that is not dependent on oil or coal for energy. Everyone can win if we do this right - workers, industry, consumers, taxpayers.
At a press conference yesterday, Senate Finance Committee member Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., and House Energy and Commerce Committee member Jay Inslee, D-Wash., urged congressional leaders to make the creation of high-quality green jobs a top priority of the economic recovery and reinvestment stimulus package. The need to pay attention to the kind of green jobs we create is highlighted in a report commissioned by labor unions, the Sierra Club and Change to Win that looked at existing jobs in solar and wind equipment construction as well as recycling and green building construction. The conclusion: while many companies treat their workers well, some provide an unsafe working environment and wages that fall below the national averages.
How to get this job done right is the topic of the conference. I'll be posting about the discussions here, including today's keynote from NRDC's Peter Lehner.
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