Energy, Climate Change
and Our Environment

The President has taken unprecedented action to build the foundation for a clean energy economy, tackle the issue of climate change, and protect our environment.

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  • In Case You Missed It: Broad Bipartisan Support to Extend the Production Tax Credit

    Posted by Heather Zichal on May 23, 2012 at 3:54 PM EST

    Tomorrow the President will travel to TPI Composites in Newton, Iowa where he will highlight steps Congress can take right now to create American jobs, and support American companies and manufacturers – all while continuing to increase clean energy production here at home.   

    As part of his Congressional To-Do List, the President will call on Congress to pass legislation that will extend the Production Tax Credit (PTC) – which provides an important tax credit to utility-scale wind producers in the United States – alongside an expansion of the 48C Advanced Energy Manufacturing Tax Credit that supports American-made clean energy manufacturing in towns and cities across the country. According to industry estimates, the wind industry supports nearly 20,000 direct jobs along with over 30,000 manufacturing jobs in its supply chain, and some in industry have estimated that without extending the PTC, as the President is calling for, up to 37,000 jobs could be lost.

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  • Unlocking the Power of Energy Data

    Posted by Todd Park, Jason Bordoff, and Dave Danielson on May 22, 2012 at 7:00 PM EST

    The U.S. Government, as well as the private sector, is sitting on a vast – and in many cases, untapped – supply of energy data.  Sets of data aren’t what most people think of when we talk about safely and responsibly developing American energy resources such as wind, solar, oil, and gas. But data are also essential components of the President’s all-of-the-above energy strategy.  To help harness the power of these data through a combination of technology and ingenuity, the Obama Administration has launched the Energy Data Initiative (EDI).  The goal of EDI is to drive entrepreneurs to use data to create tools that can help Americans save money on utility bills and at the pump – by, for example, virtually identifying cost-effective retrofits or delivering route- and vehicle-optimization tips to improve fuel efficiency. In doing so, this will generate a rising tide of innovation that can help grow the economy and create jobs. 

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  • Wrapping Up the G8 Summit at Camp David

    Posted by Megan Slack on May 19, 2012 at 7:01 PM EST

    G8 Summit in Camp David, 2012 Logo

    This weekend, the leaders of Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and Russia joined President Obama at Camp David for the annual G8 Summit. The leaders met to address major global economic, political, and security challenges, including energy and climate change, food security and nutrition, Afghanistan’s economic transition and transitions taking place across the Middle East and North Africa.

    Energy and Climate Change:

    At the Camp David Summit, G-8 Leaders recognized that the development of and universal access to environmentally safe, sustainable, secure, and affordable sources of energy is essential to global economic growth and to their overall efforts to address climate change. 

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  • Increasing Energy Efficiency and Reducing Costs in Federal Buildings

    Posted by Dan Tangherlini on May 18, 2012 at 1:47 PM EST

    As part of GSA’s core responsibility of delivering savings to government agencies, GSA has awarded a contract with IBM to work with leaders in the building sciences industry to install low-cost, high-value, networked technologies in 50 of the federal government’s most energy intensive buildings. This smart building strategy will connect building management systems to a central, cloud-based platform, improving energy efficiency and saving up to $15 million in tax dollars annually.

    Under the terms of the contract, IBM will develop an innovative system to monitor, in real-time, building performance nationwide and stream data to a central facility.  This, in turn, will give employees and building managers useful information on building operations allowing for faster analysis and more informed decision-making. Additionally, when the system is fully integrated, the buildings’ tenants and managers will be able to view the performance of their buildings on public dashboards with analysis on energy savings and recommendations on how to further increase efficiencies.

    As additional federal buildings are constructed and other facilities are upgraded, those buildings will also be managed with this platform. We expect that this initiative will keep buildings performing at peak efficiency and increase cost savings across the federal portfolio.

    GSA’s plan to meet the requirements of President Obama’s Executive Order on Federal Leadership in Environmental, Energy, and Economic Performance (EO13514) includes a goal of reducing energy consumption in federal buildings by 30 percent by 2015. Smart building technology is yet another approach that GSA is taking to increase performance and decrease costs in government buildings. It’s clear that this GSA initiative will begin a new chapter in energy efficient strategies that will deliver important savings to the taxpayer.

    For additional information on GSA’s smart building efforts please visit: gsa.gov/smartbuildings.

    Dan Tangherlini is Acting Administrator of the General Services Administration.

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  • Environmental Justice: From Strategic Planning to Action

    Posted by Gary S. Guzy on May 17, 2012 at 9:49 AM EST

    What does it take to integrate environmental justice principles into our programs and services? 

    The answers poured in enthusiastically from senior officials across the Federal Government at a recent special Deputy Secretary-level meeting of the Environmental Justice Interagency Working Group. I hosted this meeting along with U.S. EPA Deputy Administrator Bob Perciasepe to mark the completion of an historic strategic planning effort.

    Building on the Obama Administration's commitment to strong environmental and health protections for all Americans, Federal agencies and offices have been revisiting and re-invigorating their approach to environmental justice. We set out our roadmap for concerted Federal Government action last year in an interagency Memorandum of Understanding, in which agencies committed to publishing environmental justice strategies and annual progress reports on their implementation of those strategies. When the deputies gathered at our meeting, the final strategies had just been released. To ensure their relevance and rigorous implementation, the strategies reflect public input, and they focus on engraining environmental justice principles in core Government practices and programs. 

    We agreed it was time to transition from strategic planning to action. As a Working Group, we decided that  to succeed, we must prioritize our actions and leverage existing resources as much as possible, including through developing and expanding public-private partnerships and sharing best practices across agencies. I jotted down the following examples to give you a sense of what this means in practice:

    • Deputy Secretary David Hayes described the Department of the Interior's work with private companies to help provide renewable energy to remote Native Alaskan communities.
    • Assistant Secretary Howard Koh from the Department of Health and Human Services indicated that the health impact assessment tools that the Department is developing will enable federal decision-makers across the Government to identify and consider public health impacts, including those that disproportionately apply to low-income and minority communities.
    • The Department of Energy and the Department of Housing and Urban Development are developing staff and stakeholder training on environmental justice principles which may be applicable to other Federal offices as well.

    As someone who worked in the Federal Government when we first began considering environmental justice principles two decades ago, I am heartened by where we are headed today. With newfound direction and momentum, we are answering the call for systematic and durable applications of environmental justice principles to our programs and services, so we can see meaningful results.   

    Gary S. Guzy is Deputy Director of the Council on Environmental Quality

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  • Valuable Support for Maritime Industries

    Posted by Timothy W. Janaitis on May 16, 2012 at 11:55 AM EST

    Editor's Note: This blog introduces readers to Timothy W. Janaitis, Director of Business Development for global underwater services company Phoenix International Holdings, Inc., which provides 225 American jobs.

    As a global underwater services company, Phoenix International depends on our oceans. One of our internationally recognized missions took place last spring when we located and recovered both black boxes from Air France Flight 447, an aircraft that had crashed in 13,000 feet of water in the Atlantic two years earlier. We are currently preparing to launch a mission to search for, and ideally recover, the airplane of pioneering aviator Amelia Earhart lost in the South Pacific 75 years ago.

    On a broader scale, our company provides underwater operations, engineering and construction support to those who have economic, environmental and cultural interests in the oceans. We see new business opportunities in areas such as the emerging offshore renewable energy industry. Development of this and other offshore industries represents significant growth potential for us.

    So it is with great frustration that we see companies departing the renewable market due, in part, to a lack of clear ground rules in federal waters that slows the level and pace of project approvals. Clearly, we need a consistent framework in which investors and developers can propose and bring their technologies offshore as quickly and safely as possible within the established guidelines. This requires a sensible regulatory environment, and cooperation among all interested parties, including agencies and stakeholders.

    The National Ocean Policy provides the needed framework to stimulate job creation and economic growth, not only at Phoenix International, but at other ocean dependent businesses and organizations as well. All Americans have an interest in healthy oceans, and thriving ocean industries. Citizens who have diverse -- and sometimes conflicting -- interests and needs must have a process that allows for constructive dialogue, so they can find solutions. Only in this way can consistent ground rules and processes be established that allow energy and other offshore developers to have their proposed initiatives expeditiously and properly evaluated. The National Ocean Policy and the work of the Regional Planning Bodies allow for such representation and decision-making, and should be embraced as valuable support for maritime industries. 

    Timothy W. Janaitis is Director of Business Development for Phoenix International Holdings, Inc.

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