Get Energy Smart! NOW!

Developing a lower total ownership cost (TOC) can often require paying a bit more money upfront. When it comes to energy efficiency and renewable energy (EE/RE), that upfront incremental cost is too frequently a barrier to achieving that more cost effective longer term solution. A bond program targeted specifically for EE/RE in government facilities [...]

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The Obama Administration seems to be pulling back, on front after front, in the face of economic challenges, sobering poll numbers, and steadfast Republican obstinacy. Whether on health care, jobs promoting legislation, EPA regulation of pollutants, and/or energy/climate policy, the political powers that be within the Obama White House have determined that ‘tactical retreats’ toward [...]

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This guest post comes from Tim Lange (Meteor Blades), who was a founding (board) member of Energize America. This is posted as part of a serious looking at clean energy jobs‘ opportunities for sparking meaningful employment, quickly, in the United States as discussed in Clean Energy Jobs: Stimulate Me
At the Jobs Summit coming up Thursday, [...]

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With our ever mounting trade and budget deficits, unemployment above 10 percent (and, dependent on counting, un- and under-employment above 20 percent), looming peak oil and other resource (water, for example) limitations, enviornmental challenges, and ever-mounting climate chaos , we are in a very serious situation. Our serious challenges are, as the previous [...]

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Electrification of rail is one of the most effective currently available technology paths for reducing carbon emissions.
It should be on the top of the policy agenda.
It is, basically, nowhere to be found.
Here is a guest post by the very thoughtful BruceMcF, looking at this gap and providing a path forward for addressing it.
Transport For America [...]

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The strong success of the CARS Program (WIN on economic stimulus, with wins environmentally, energy security, and highway safety) have led to consideration of what to do next. Last week, Senators Senator Bingaman, Snowe, Kerry, and Lugar introduced S. 1620, Efficient Vehicle Leadership Act of 2009. This act would set up a feebate [...]

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Hybrids are too often thought of simply in terms of personal vehicles.
They are also penetrating the big vehicle market space. Consider the average delivery truck and all its starts/stops. There is a lot of energy to capture there, which is why UPS is pursuing hybrids. And, as per Walmart and its hybrid trucks, they are [...]

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The draft Energize America “American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009″ went out today. Let’s be upfront: it has some GREAT elements and some, well, pretty not great aspects. We are in a very serious situation, but the serious challenge is not just economic, but an intersecting set of challenges and [...]

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President Obama and Congress must act to stimulate the US economy with a package of win-win-win-win (W4) elements that will:

Create and protect jobs throughout the nation
Foster economic activity that will help, through tax revenue, pay for the stimulus
Strengthen the nation’s economic prospects for the long-term, and
Help address other critical challenges: notably energy security and climate [...]

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Stimulate
Etymology: From Latin stimulatus past participle of stimul? (“goad on”) .
Verb: to stimulate: To encourage into action. To arouse an organism to functional activity.
Synonyms: encourage, induce, provoke, animate, arouse, energize, energise, excite, perk up
Antonyms: de-energize, sedate, stifle
For eight long years, this nation has been de-energized, had productive advancing of the economy stifled, and good [...]

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