Testimony before the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming

Opportunities For Green Growth: Myths & Realities About Green Jobs

Chairman Markey and members of the Committee, thank you for inviting me here today.

I am here representing Green For All, a national organization dedicated to helping to build an inclusive, green economy – strong enough to lift millions of people out of poverty.

I first testified before this esteemed committee in May 2007. At that time, the term “green collar job” only rarely had been heard in the halls of Congress. The term had seldom – if ever – appeared in the mainstream political press.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest has prepared and released a report on how science and science advice can fall victim to politics (Twisted Advice: Federal Advisory Committees are Broken).

The Center’s report says . . .

Charles F. Kennel, Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric Science at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and founding director of the Environment and Sustainability Initiative at the University of California, San Diego, writes in the Winter 2009 Issues in Science and Technology

The U.S. Geological Survey has led an assessment authored by a team of climate scientists from the Federal government and academe. The report (Synthesis and Assessment Product 3.4: Abrupt Climate Change) was commissioned by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program with contributions from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Science Foundation. The assessment notes that the United States faces . . .

A National Research Council Committee report says that “. . . [t]he U.S. Environmental Protection Agency should examine whether combined exposures to chemicals known as phthalates could cause adverse health effects in humans. The Committee goes on to say the examination, called a cumulative risk assessment,

The National Science Foundation has announced that two of its “. . . sponsored say public acceptance of the relatively new, nature-altering science of nanotechnology isn’t a foregone conclusion. Instead, the studies indicate continued concern.”

The Foundation goes on to say that “Federal entities are looking into safety and public acceptance

The U.S. Geological Survey’s National Water-Quality Assessment (NAWQA) Program/Source Water-Quality Assessment (SWQA) Program has released a wealth of information on “Man-Made Chemicals Found in Drinking Water at Low Levels“.

The Survey finds that low levels of certain man-made chemicals remain in public water supplies after being treated in selected community water facilities.

Lynn Maguire and James Justus argue (Why Intrinsic Value Is a Poor Basis for Conservation Decisions) in a recent issue of Bioscience that “. . . [c]onservationists from Muir to McCauley have championed intrinsic value as the right basis for conservation, one that derives from qualities innate to nonhuman biota, independent of human affairs. They argue that intrinsic value acknowledges the integrity of all species and ecosystems, protects them from short-term human whims, and gives conservation the ethical status it deserves.

In a just released report, the National Research Council Committee on the Ecological Impacts of Climate Change highlights the need “[t]o illuminate how climate change has affected specific species and ecosystems.” The report, “Ecological Impacts of Climate Change“, documents a series of case studies of the ecological impacts of climate change that have been observed, to date, across the United States.

You should have noticed that this week the Earth Portal features in its Environment in Focus series a broad assessment of large corporations beyond the realm of simple economics. This summer, the Conference Board of Canada released “The Role of the Board of Directors in Corporate Social Responsibility.” The Board notes that from the Canadian perspective

Research from the December 2008 issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, conducted by investigators from Brown University, the University of California-Berkeley, and the Silent Spring Institute notes that people often do not connect their household use of chemical substances with their own personal chemical exposure and subsequent adverse health effects.

Paint a scenario with a human population of 6.4 billion—with nearly 854 million men, women and children chronically hungry—where, in all, over 2 billion people lack food security—we have a problem.

The Food and Agriculture Organization has released “The State of Food and Agriculture 2008”. The report “ . . [e]xplores