Government Policies

The recession continues to put many Americans in a difficult situation where demand for their specialized skills is mediocre at best. That hurts everybody because there’s less productivity which eventually translates into less spending and less demand for goods and services. Obama claims the solution to that problem is not only re-training people, but creating renewed demand for existing skills in the form of green jobs.

What kind of green jobs? One major example Obama cited was advanced battery manufacturing. Think of the batteries that power the 2011 Chevrolet Volt, or the Nissan LEAF. China is focused on being a major player in battery manufacturing too, so healthy competition between the two countries is sure to continue.

Government officials in the US and UK are facing a similar problem; they’ve got to find a way to trim their budgets. Many have singled out the cost of printing documents as an expense that can be replaced by new technology. If they relied on gadgets like the iPad they could do away with the cost of paper, copy machine maintenance, and the distribution of documents. While some in the US have found success with the iPad, some spots in the UK are facing an uphill battle.

The iPad was an instant hit in Congress due to its ability to store a lot of paperwork, edit legislation on the fly, and catch up on the latest news. Other lawmakers thought that the same ideas could be applied to areas such as the city of Williamsburg, Virginia.

On July 25, a pipeline broke and spilled nearly one million gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo River in Michigan. It is the worst spill in Michigan history and experts say it will it be years before the area can support native plants, wildlife, migratory birds and human recreational activity. While small in comparison to the Gulf oil disaster, the Kalamazoo spill represents one dot in a pervasive pattern of mismanagement and disregard in the oil and gas industry. A new report from the National Wildlife Federation catalogues how the pursuit of oil has contributed to hundreds of deaths, explosions, spills, toxic emissions and habitat loss over the past decade.

Take the world’s current situation which right now places most of its energy needs squarely on the shoulders of fossil fuels, and mesh that with the renewable energy efforts taking place and what do you get?. Looking forward a couple of decades, venture capitalist Vinod Khosla predicts that the U.S. will be producing too much energy and that demand won’t keep up. He thinks that boost in output will arrive from renewable sources and wants to see more focus on technology innovation which in his words has “infinite” potential.

If nothing else, Khosla is a smart (or lucky) marketer because his idea has just enough appeal and strangeness to create buzz. If the U.S. is successful in its continuing efforts to generate lots of renewable energy, and population growth remains similar to what it is today, then feasibly energy generation would catch up to demand at some point.

When a new coalition government took power last May, Prime Minister David Cameron made it clear that cuts were needed to control Britain’s budget. Traditional areas like police and emergency services have been trimmed and the entire UK Film Council was shut down. A decision to scrap a subsidy program to encourage the purchase of electric and “low-carbon” cars was saved with a little help from Nissan and Mitsubishi.

The subsidy program was created by the Labour government in 2009, and promised a 25% subsidy up to £5,000 (about $7,800) for people that purchase electric, plug-in hybrid or hydrogen fuel cell cars. It was thought that the plan could not only help the country hit their carbon targets, but also generate green jobs in the manufacturing sector.

Yellow taxis are icons in New York City and appear on every street corner and frequently pop up in the movies. They may be a beloved form of transportation but they are often gas guzzling sedans that get horrible gas mileage. While many Americans are looking forward to hybrid and plug-in cars like the Volt or Leaf, it appears that New York City’s taxi owners don’t want to use green technology to transport passengers.

Ford’s Crown Victoria is the king of New York’s 13,401 taxis due to its reliability and roomy interior. The “Crown Vic” may offer a comfortable ride, but it only gets 12 to 14 mpg while traveling in the city. Each cab also averages 100,000 miles per year, a number that certainly contributes to carbon emissions.

Residents in Battle Creek, MI are advised to steer clear of the Kalamazoo river because some 840,000 gallons of oil have leaked into it, creating potentially hazardous fumes. The oil isn’t stopping there though, it’s moving toward Lake Michigan and may be there within several days. This oil spill, in tandem with the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and other recent oil spills certainly point to a systemic problem in the way we’re transporting and creating energy.

Electricity is the driver behind it because it provides ultimate convenience; our way of life would change drastically without it. Instead of working to convince people that they don’t “need” things, maybe we should spend more time and resources on developing technology that will create energy without side effects. Fusion energy holds that potential, and it’s the same energy our sun broadcasts into space every day.

In recent years, the government has shown strong support for any initiatives and programs that further energy innovation. But it seems there’s a limit to how much risk even the government is willing to take on because it recently pulled the plug on Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE). That’s made many supporters angry because with PACE, they were able to afford green energy installations by breaking up payments over 20 years.

Local governments issued bonds which generated cash for home and business owners seeking to build out energy improvements in their home or business. Property owners would then pay down the government loan over 20 years from a yearly tax assessment. Theoretically the tax assessment would stick with the property even if it changed hands to a new owner, assuming deals like that survive negotiations between buyer and seller.

BP may have successfully capped the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico but they may have an even bigger problem ahead. Several US lawmakers have petitioned the State Department to investigate whether there is a link between the release of the Lockerbie bomber and BP’s offshore drilling rights in Libya.

Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi was found guilty of murder due to his involvement in the 1988 bombing of Pan-Am flight 103. In 2001 he was sentenced to a minimum of twenty years due to the “horrendous nature” of the crime that killed 259 passengers and 11 people on the ground in Lockerbie, Scotland.

Knowing where your food comes from is a popular topic among chefs. They want to know exactly where their potatoes were dug up from and if their beef was fed grass rather than corn. So, it’s no wonder that many chefs are wondering about seafood from the Gulf Coast in the wake of the BP Oil spill. A group of chefs including Chicago’s Rick Tramonto and Top Chef’s Tom Colicchio decided that they needed first hand knowledge of the situation.

The duo were joined by a number of chefs including Susur Lee and sustainable seafood advocate Rick Moonen in Louisiana last week. Their aim was to get as much information from local and federal officials on the safety of the seafood so they could educate their diners who had been asking a lot of questions.