Green Labor Journal - Working for a Substainable Future

The Wait is Over

Nearly a year after the House passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act, Senators Kerry and Lieberman release clean energy and climate bill, the American Power Act.

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May 14, 2010 - Nearly a year after the U.S. House of Representatives passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act, Senators John Kerry and Joe Lieberman finally released their clean energy and climate bill, the American Power Act, on Wednesday, May 12.

A diversity of environmental groups, businesses and others praised Kerry and Lieberman for pushing clean energy and climate issues to the forefront of the national debate and urged Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to bring the bill before the full Senate as quickly as possible. However, many groups plan to withhold their endorsement of the 987-page bill until it is strengthened in several key areas, and few labor unions have put out official statements about the legislation.

Apollo Alliance Chairman Phil Angelides said, “The Apollo Alliance applauds Senators Kerry and Lieberman for their leadership in moving the country toward adopting comprehensive climate and clean energy policies that will increase U.S. energy security, reduce harmful carbon emissions, and create millions of American jobs that will put our citizens back to work in a new generation of clean energy jobs.

“During the weeks and months ahead, the Apollo Alliance will work with our diverse coalition of business, labor, community and environmental leaders to ensure that our nation seizes this opportunity to invest in American businesses to create new jobs producing the clean technologies of the future. It makes no sense to shift our dependence on foreign oil to a new reliance on foreign-made clean energy products. We need to meet new clean energy demand with American workers making the parts, systems and components of the clean energy economy.”

The Apollo Alliance’s research team has been analyzing the bill and comparing its measures to those we call for in our New Apollo Program. Following is a summary of some of the key components in the American Power Act as well as important measures that are missing from the legislation:

The most important element of the American Power Act is that it caps and puts a price on greenhouse gas emissions. It also sets targets for reducing emissions to 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 80 percent below 2005 levels by 2050. Putting a price on polluting emissions will give businesses an incentive to switch to cleaner sources of energy and should lead to significant private investment in the clean energy sector.

Another positive element of the bill is that it contains much-needed investments to reduce transportation sector emissions through support for public transit and other projects, as well as to expand infrastructure and manufacturing capacity for plug-in electric and natural-gas powered vehicles. 

Key measures that are missing from the bill are a national renewable energy standard, which would ensure consistent and long-term investment in renewable energy resources; and transition assistance for workers and communities that are negatively impacted by clean energy and climate policies. The bill also lacks explicit language clarifying that projects funded by carbon allowance revenues are subject to prevailing wage requirements; these requirements are one way to ensure that green jobs are also good jobs.

The American Power Act includes some important investments aimed at strengthening domestic clean energy manufacturing. For example, it dedicates $5 billion toward the expansion of the Advanced Energy Manufacturing Tax Credit program, a successful program created by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The bill would also create a Clean Vehicle Technology Fund to support the manufacture of advanced technology vehicles.

Unfortunately, the American Power Act does not include long-term support for domestic clean energy manufacturers along the lines of Sen. Sherrod Brown’s Investments for Manufacturing Progress and Clean Technology (IMPACT) Act. The IMPACT Act would authorize $30 billion to establish state-level revolving loan funds to help small and medium-sized manufacturers retrain workers, retool facilities for clean energy production, and become more energy efficient. It would also expand funding for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership program, thereby ensuring that small and mid-sized manufacturers have access to the technical assistance needed to enter clean energy supply chains.

According to Apollo Alliance estimates, these investments would create 680,000 direct American manufacturing jobs and nearly 2 million indirect jobs over the next five years.

The IMPACT Act has been endorsed by numerous labor unions, businesses and environmental organizations, and those groups will be working over the coming months to ensure that provisions like those contained in IMPACT get incorporated into the final Senate clean energy and climate bill. This is the only way to make certain that the U.S. becomes a leading global producer of clean-energy technologies, rather than just a consumer of them.

In a Huffington Post op-ed published on Wednesday, Sen. Kerry wrote, “Look, it’s long, long overdue for America to lead. Economically, we need to get out in front of the clean energy economy of the 21st century to become the leader on technologies that will power the world. Other countries aren’t waiting on this. China just raised their auto-efficiency standards to over 36 miles a gallon, and last year, for the first time, China’s investment in clean energy exceeded ours. We can’t let this continue. I want to close the energy gap with China, not let a lack of political willpower allow it to grow.

“And, in terms of our planet’s climate, we need to lead the way — or, at this point, finally join the parade.”

The Apollo Alliance couldn’t agree more. With hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil spilling into the Gulf of Mexico every day, what greater reminder do we need that the United States needs to shift to cleaner sources of energy—and make that shift now!

Click here to read the American Power Act or a summary of it, and visit ApolloAlliance.org for more information on how the American Power Act compares to the New Apollo Program.

Andrea Buffa is Senior Writer and Policy Associate for the Apollo Alliance, buffa@apolloalliance.org, (415) 371-1700 X209, http://www.apolloalliance.org.  The Apollo Alliance will be contributing a monthly column to the Green Labor Journal.