In another display of the sea change that has occurred at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency under the current, Obama administration, a new report was issued yesterday regarding indicators of climate change. The report, “Climate Change Indicators in the United States,” measures 24 separate indicators showing how climate change affects the health and environment of U.S. citizens.

The report represents another step in a series of actions and statements taken on the climate change by the EPA. This EPA has proved to be more active than during previous administrations on this issue. It has labeled CO2 as a gas that can be regulated under the Clean Air Act as a significant greenhouse gas.

New vehicle emissions standards have been established as well as greenhouse gas standards for such vehicles. On April 15, the EPA published the National U.S. Greenhouse Gas Inventory. The Climate/Energy Bill currently working its way through the Senate has been heavily influenced by EPA actions and consultations. And now a report is issued regarding the indicators of climate change.

“These indicators show us that climate change is a very real problem with impacts that are already being seen,” said Gina McCarthy, assistant administrator for the EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation. “The actions Americans are taking today to save energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions will help us solve this global challenge.”

The following are some of the key climate change indicators.

• Greenhouse gas emissions from human sources are increasing. From 1990 to 2008, emissions have grown by 14 percent in the United States.
• Average temperatures are rising. Seven of the top ten warmest years on record for the continental US have occurred since 1990.
• Tropical cyclone intensity has increased in recent decades. Of the ten most active hurricane seasons, six have happened since the mid 1990’s.
• Sea levels have risen between 1993 and 2008 at twice the rate of the long-term trend.
• Glaciers are melting and their loss of volume has accelerated over the last decade.
• The frequency of heat waves has steadily risen since the 1960s. The percentage of the U.S. population experiencing heat waves has also increased.

Collecting and analyzing environmental indicators can help in understanding the causes of climate change as well as predict what the future will bring. Understanding this is critical in devising strategies to avoid the worst effects of climate change as well as devising strategies for adapting to a different climate. The EPA’s report primarily describes trends within the United States but also includes global trends to provide a basis for comparison.

The report includes some very sobering statistics of how climate change is affecting a range of things like temperature, precipitation, sea levels, and extreme weather. Knowing these trends now can greatly help in the future as we grade ourselves on efforts that we undertake to address climate change.

Article by David A. Gabel appearing courtesy Enviromental News Network.

photo: suburbanbloke

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Today President Obama travelled to Iowa and visited Siemens Energy, Inc., where he received a tour of the facility and saw the creation of blades that are capable of generating enough power for hundreds of homes. The President said that each employee of Siemens “Is helping stake America’s claim on a clean-energy future.”

The President discussed the future of clean energy in America, calling energy security “a top priority for my administration since the day I took office.” He explained that the Recovery Act made the largest investment in clean energy in the nation’s history- an investment expected to create or save 700,000 jobs by the end of 2012 and double America’s capacity to generate renewable electricity from sources like the sun and the wind:

So in the midst of the economic turmoil, the Recovery Act helped make it possible for America to install nearly 10 gigawatts of new wind-generating capacity last year alone -– and that’s enough to power more than 2.4 million American homes.  So when people ask you what was the Recovery Act about, what was the stimulus about, it was about this — this plant.

The President praised Iowa for already generating a higher percentage of electricity from wind than any other state because of facilities like Siemens Energy:

And as extraordinary as this facility is, here’s the thing  — wind power isn’t a silver bullet, it’s not going to solve all our energy challenges.  There’s no single energy source.  The key is to understand that this is a key component, a key part of a comprehensive strategy to move us from an economy that just runs on fossil fuels to one that relies on more homegrown fuels and clean energy.  I believe that we can come together around this issue and pass comprehensive energy and climate legislation that will ignite new industries, spark new jobs in towns just like Fort Madison, make America more energy-independent.  Our security, our economy, the future of our planet all depend on it.

Article by Jesse Lee appearing courtesy the White House Blog.

photo: Lawrence Jackson/White House

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It’s been a busy Earth Day at the White House and around the administration. Yesterday Vice President Biden kicked off the Administration’s Earth Day Celebration by announcing $452 million in Recovery Act funding to support a “Retrofit Ramp-Up.” This program will create thousands of jobs and allow these communities to retrofit hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses while testing out innovative strategies that can be adopted all over the country. President Obama also issued a Presidential Proclamation on Earth Day calling on Americans to join in the spirit of the first Earth Day forty years ago to take action in their communities to make our planet cleaner and healthier.

This afternoon, Carol Browner, Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change, hosted a live chat on WhiteHouse.gov to answer your questions about how the Administration is working to improve the environment and build a clean energy economy that supports the jobs of the future. This evening, the President hosted an Earth Day reception in the Rose Garden at the White House where he discussed some of the challenges that lie ahead in achieving a clean energy economy:

“I think we all understand that the task ahead is daunting; that the work ahead will not be easy and it’s not going to happen overnight. It’s going to take your leadership. It’s going to take all of your ideas. And it will take all of us coming together in the spirit of Earth Day — not only on Earth Day but every day — to make the dream of a clean energy economy and a clean world a reality.”

Over on the Social Innovation and Civic Participation blog, guest blogger and former Peace Corps volunteer Kelly McCormack shares here story about a community solution to an environmental problem in Guatemala.

Finally, President Obama’s cabinet and other senior government officials fanned out across the country as part of the Administration’s 5-day celebration of the 40th anniversary of Earth Day. From live chats, to announcing major investments in renewable energy, to appearing on the David Letterman show – all-in-all a busy day!

Last October, the Middle Class Task Force and the Council on Environmental Quality released a report called “Recovery Through Retrofit”(pdf). “Retrofitting” is a fancy word for making your house more energy efficient and more comfortable – everything from putting in a new water heater to sealing up cracks and openings where air can leak into and out of a home.

Our report identified some of the biggest barriers to building a strong, sustainable home energy retrofit industry. And it laid out an action plan to overcome them by making retrofits more affordable, giving homeowners straightforward information about the benefits of energy efficient upgrades, and building a well-trained workforce to get the job done.

For the last several months, we’ve been working hard to implement the recommendations in our report. Yesterday, the Vice President made an announcement that builds on the work we’ve been doing. He announced that 25 communities across the country have been selected for “Retrofit Ramp-Up” awards through the Recovery Act. This program will create thousands of jobs and allow these communities to retrofit hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses while testing out innovative strategies that can be adopted all over the country.

Growing the retrofit industry is a priority of the Task Force because it will create jobs, cut energy use and help families save money. As the Vice President said yesterday, it’s a “triple win.” So we hope you’ll take some time to learn more about Retrofit Ramp-Up. And if you missed our Task Force report the first time around, please check it out (pdf).

Happy Earth Day from the Middle Class Task Force!

–Brian Levine, Deputy Domestic Policy Advisor to the Vice President

A Triple Win

Impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act on the Clean Energy Transformation

A central piece of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) is more than $90 billion in government investment and tax incentives to lay the foundation for the clean energy economy of the future.  These investments and tax incentives include everything from energy efficiency retrofits to modernizing the electrical grid to tax credits for advanced clean energy manufacturing.  These clean energy investments are also providing crucial stimulus to the economy today.

The CEA’s third quarterly report on the impact of the ARRA, released on April 14, found that the Act as a whole raised employment by between 2.2 million and 2.8 million jobs over what it would otherwise have been.  In a new supplement to the report, we focus in detail on the macroeconomic impact of the Act’s clean energy provisions.

The clean energy provisions in the ARRA are grouped into nine functional categories.  Of the original $787 billion estimated cost of the Act, $90 billion was devoted to clean energy programs.  Nearly $40 billion of this total has already been obligated for specific clean energy projects, and more than $9 billion has been outlayed.

To estimate the short-run economic impact of the ARRA’s clean energy investments, we use the CEA macroeconomic model described in our third quarterly report.  We find that the Recovery Act created more than 80,000 clean energy jobs as of the first quarter of 2010, and that the clean energy investments supported an additional 20,000 jobs throughout the economy.  Importantly, these estimates include only employment related to projects that have received actual outlays to date.

In many cases, the additional $20 billion in obligations may have already generated economic activity because recipients may begin spending as soon as they are certain funds are available.  Looking over a longer horizon, the ARRA’s clean energy provisions will support about 720,000 job-years through 2012.  (A job-year is the equivalent of one worker employed for one year.)  Thus the Act will be a source of both employment and progress on clean energy for years to come.

–Christina Romer, the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers

Every Day is Earth Day for Peace Corps Volunteers

Following is an Earth Day story about a Peace Corps volunteer with a community solution to an environmental problem. Happy Earth Day!

No one would ever know that the walls of a two-room elementary school in Granados, Guatemala were created with plastic bottles. Unless, that is, you helped Laura Kutner, an innovative third-year Peace Corps Volunteer from Portland, Ore., and her community complete the project, which proved to be a sustainable, environmentally friendly, and cost-effective alternative to traditional construction. Kutner and many of my former Peace Corps/Guatemala colleagues have helped their communities construct, what we like to call, “bottle schools,” which are constructed by enclosing plastic bottles in a chicken-wire frame and covering them with concrete to create walls. They use the bottles — which were cleaned and filled with plastic bags, chip wrappers, aluminum, and Styrofoam discarded in the community — as an alternative to cinder block.

n Kutner’s case, students and community partners helped to collect so many bottles and trash, they had to go to surrounding communities to find more discarded materials to build the school. This project sparked the community’s interest in pollution, recycling and waste management. Other Guatemalans have taken note, and Peace Corps Volunteers across the Central American country are in the process of building schools, walls and recycling centers out of trash. And, if Volunteers aren’t involved in bottle construction, they are working to educate their local communities about the importance of respecting the environment, or on a variety of other projects.

Peace Corps Volunteers are faced with the challenging task of accessing community needs, brainstorming sustainable projects with local people, garnering their support and finding grassroots funding. Peace Corps is a unique experience, Volunteers partner with local communities and both live and work where they serve. Among other projects on Earth Day, Peace Corps Volunteers worldwide are engaged in establishing forest conservation plans, helping develop alternatives to wood as a fuel source, and collaborating with various organizations to promote environmental awareness. Click here to see more examples of Volunteers’ work.

Peace Corps Volunteers are encouraged to share their experiences with Americans upon return from service. Many former Peace Corps Volunteers use Earth Day to speak about their service and environmental conservation. As Peace Corps approaches its 50th anniversary, its service legacy continues to promote peace and friendship around the world with 7,671 volunteers serving in 76 host countries. To learn more about the Peace Corps, please visit our website.

–Kelly McCormack recently returned from Peace Corps/Guatemala. She now works in the Peace Corps Communications Office.

OSTP Celebrates Earth Day 2010 with Public Lecture, New GLOBE Report

OSTP Director John P. Holdren will give a free public lecture at the University of California, Berkeley, this evening as part of the White House’s celebration of Earth Day 2010. Dr. Holdren’s talk, “Science and Technology for Sustainable Well-Being: Priorities and Policies in the Obama Administration,” will highlight Administration initiatives that are addressing the pressing economic, environmental, energy-, and climate-related challenges facing the Nation today.

Dr. Holdren will also note that today marks not only the 40th anniversary of Earth Day but also the 15th anniversary of a Federal program that embodies the central principles of Earth Day—the Global Learning & Observations to Benefit the Environment, or “GLOBE,” program. OSTP today released a new report that affirms the many benefits of that environmental education program—launched on Earth Day 1995—and lays out a map for future accomplishments.

GLOBE is a worldwide primary- and secondary-school-based science and education program designed to open up the world of scientific discovery to students by getting them into the field to make actual environmental measurements, such as air temperature, waterway acidity, and sunlight intensity. Since its launch in 1995, the program has grown to connect—in an enormous data-sharing network—more than 20,000 schools in 112 countries.

Students in GLOBE schools, along with the 50,000 teachers that GLOBE has trained in those schools, have collected and uploaded more than 20 million environmental and climate measurements in the past 15 years—a data set that is openly available for collaborative scientific research by students and professional scientists alike.

“GLOBE is an important tool for educating the next generation of climate and environmental scientists, giving students the opportunity to share in the excitement of scientific discovery in their own backyards,” Dr. Holdren said.

The new report, produced by OSTP, reaffirms the value of GLOBE as part of the Obama Administration’s commitment to science education and environmental stewardship and lays out important goals for the years ahead—in particular an enhanced focus on climate education that focuses on global warming, the carbon and energy footprint, climate and human health, and ecosystems, agriculture, and biodiversity.

For more details about GLOBE, see our full release or http://www.globe.gov.

GLOBE is just one element in an array of programs and activities being supported by the Administration in the domain of environmental science and education, many of which are highlighted on a special Earth Day website launched this week by the White House.

Article and photo republished from the White House Blog.

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On President Obama’s second Earth Day in office, how far have green jobs come toward fixing unemployment and environmental ills? The administration aims for 5 million green jobs to grow in the next 10 years. Should Americans still believe the “hype?” Here’s the latest in green jobs news from around the Web:

The White House early in 2009 announced $500 million for efforts to train green workers, and this January it described job-training grants worth $100 million of that package. But that’s not nearly enough cash for an effort that should be as big as the Space Race, says pundit Jesse Jenkins. And contrary to conventional wisdom, green jobs are already being exported beyond U.S. borders.
(Breakthrough Institute)

For now, “fewer than 200 factories in the United States are devoted to green production, employing no more than 15,000 workers.” Companies can apply for new, federal tax credits to boost U.S. manufacturing, but an economist finds that “fewer than 500 applications have been filed so far for the tax breaks, and if all were approved they would add just 75,000 green manufacturing jobs.”
(New York Times)

Yet, 10 percent of employers have added new, green jobs in the past year, according to a CareerBuilder poll of 2,700 hiring managers. Among the green occupations described as earning more than $60,000 on the job Web site are hydrologist, solar energy system designer, waste management engineer and urban planner. (However, CareerBuilder’s GoingGreenJobs site was kaput on Wednesday.)
(press release)

The mayor of Joliet, Ill., joins leaders from coast to coast in selling his depressed locale as a green jobs hotspot for the future. There’s a new wind farm on the outskirts of town, and a dedicated crew at a junior college green jobs training program. But residents and experts of the former industrial center find interest stronger than green hiring, and hope the talk will prove more than a passing fad.
(Wall Street Journal)

Twenty-five communities will get a slice of federal stimulus dollars to speed up efforts to retrofit buildings for energy efficiency. Vice President Joe Biden announced the “Retrofit Ramp-Up” initiative Wednesday. Meanwhile, the new “Cash for Caulkers” federal incentive to make homes more energy efficient is available in every state.
(ABC News)

Two Midwestern senators introduced the GREEN Jobs Act of 2010 with the creative acronym: Grow Renewable Energy from Ethanol Naturally. They hope to continue expired tax credits for the makers of biofuel and ethanol, saving tens of thousands of jobs. However, the ecological benefits of such fuels remain controversial.
(Mother Nature Network)

Researchers at the University of California at Berkeley insist that the state’s global warming law, AB 32, will churn out green jobs. But detractors miss that the law “will change many jobs and require retraining for workers. For example, when California switches to cleaner trucks, it won’t so much affect the number of trucking jobs, but it will certainly require new skills,” according to economist Carol Zabin.
(Los Angeles Times)

IBM and Columbia University launched “Smarter Students for a Smarter Planet” this week to groom would-be engineers in green fields.
(SolveClimate)

The new Ecotech Institute in Denver will offer certification and two-year degree options.  Launched by the for-profit Education Corporation of America as the only green school of its kind, its associate degrees will cover fields such as electrical engineering technology, energy and environmental paralegal and sustainable interior design.
(Mother Nature Network)

Van Jones, target of the wrath of Fox News pundit Glenn Beck, lasted only a matter of months as the green jobs “czar” of the White House. What’s he up to now?
(Grist)

Worms are getting paid? Oops, never mind.
(CleanTechnica)

Also to watch:

This post has been updated.

photo: greenforall

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Many moons — and political news cycles — ago, I was very critical of the Obama administration’s “Cash for Clunkers” program, as much on green (environmental) impact as on green (cash) grounds. Later, I briefly became a darling of the Republican right when I was similarly skeptical of the “Cash for Refrigerators” appliance rebate proposal (they subsequently boomeranged on me when I questioned the relevance of ClimateGate).

But this is not about me. It is about the future of the “Cash for Stuff” model. Even as odds of getting a comprehensive energy and environment bill wane in this congressional session, a “Cash for…” proposal worth supporting has emerged.

And to the delight of bloggers and wordsmiths everywhere, it is as alliterative as it is promising. I give you “Cash for Caulkers.”For specifics, Renee Loth has a great outline and an endorsement of the bill in the Boston Globe.

Cash for Caulkers is the best of all worlds because it does everything cap-and-trade might do without dredging up any of the political opposition. The bill highlights the promise of energy efficiency as the best way forward, especially in light of recent and ongoing developments across the energy, environment, business and political fronts.

Energy efficiency leaves aside the fights over nuclear safety, the viability of emerging renewables (and their politically unpalatable subsidies), the growing disbelief in climate change science, the geopolitics of fossil fuels and the domestic political tangles over drilling. Instead, it delivers savings to consumers, creates jobs, increases security, and slows the frantic scramble for new fuel supply. And, if you’re an energy user, and you’d rather not play ball, so be it.

Politically, energy efficiency and Cash for Caulkers defuse the two ticking time bombs of the cap-and-trade debate last fall: First, it can be implemented while avoiding any discussion of climate change science, if necessary. And in an election year, with polls showing belief in climate change science below 50 percent, it may just be necessary to avoid the subject.

Second, large-scale energy efficiency can happen now, without triggering a major inflection point for our economic system or even stoking the rhetoric or fears about unintended consequences.

Rather than view the recent Obama announcements on nukes and drilling as a bald, short-term political play, they have to be interpreted as an acknowledgment by the White House that in spite of the administration’s aspirational goals, obstacles to broad scale renewable adoption still exist (technology, siting and regulation, among others). Cue energy efficiency!

The problem has always been motivation. Consumers are looking for instant gratification. Utilities find incentives to pursue the safe, affordable, reliable operation that satisfies regulators come rate-making time. And investors and governments like splashy green tech plays.

In other words, energy efficiency isn’t sexy. Plus, it has a long and sordid history. But, with states (including my own, Massachusetts) setting up regulatory conditions (especially in the electricity sector) that incentivize key players to go after each kilowatt hour with gusto, 2010 should be the year that turns the debate.

Clearly, we will not get a price on carbon this year. That was the administration’s plan to bridge the price gap for the still-emerging renewable technologies that still command a steep premium. But efficiency works at any price, especially in deregulated states where utilities no longer have a stake in expanding generation capacity.

In those states, the companies that still control most everyone’s access to power can now pursue the long-hoped-for evolution to ”decoupled” markets where they capture just as much revenue for each kilowatt hour saved as they do for those sold. With somewhere around one-third of domestic carbon emissions coming from buildings, energy efficiency programs that can tap into utility access to ratepayer dollars and customer meters have huge potential upside.

And, energy efficiency is (ahem) “shovel-ready.” Both on the state and national levels, means-tested energy efficiency programs have made use of a winning combination: 1) community-based, governmental and nonprofit organizations, 2) invested utility partners and 3) entrepreneur auditors and contractors.

Energy efficiency can make immediate use of our existing framework and technology. Going full bore after energy efficiency savings and funding programs would not do anything to derail long-term efforts to change that paradigm, the way that many feel new nuclear capacity, clean coal subsidies or expanded offshore drilling might.

If utility regulations and incentives are tweaked properly, solutions like those offered by Cash for Caulkers could be deployed rapidly, on the existing grid that serves most of America’s electrical load.  Pointing back to Massachusetts, that state’s largest utility recently testified before Congress on the mutual benefit for consumers, regulators, utilities and the environment under the Commonwealth’s approved energy efficiency plan.

Also, since the utilities claim revenue from the savings and not the programs themselves, the plan would stoke the fires of start-up small businesses that drive job growth. Energy efficiency creates jobs in technology research and development and program development and implementation, from high tech smart grid to nitty-gritty weatherization.

Indeed, under the Bay State’s program, just one energy efficiency and retrofit project under the City of Boston’s “Renew Boston” program created more than 850 jobs and contributed to energy savings, carbon reduction and improvement of housing stock in an economically depressed community.

Call it “Cash for Caulkers,” or by its formal name, Home Star. Whatever you call it, it promises to be a win for energy consumers, job seekers, utilities, communities, our country and the planet — both consumer groups, environmental advocates and industry and business groups think so. Now, let’s see if that coalition can get an energy bill passed in this Congress.

photo: ziggy fresh

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Four Democratic U.S. senators have asked the Obama administration to stop investment in wind power and other renewable energy projects until the government ensures that the projects primarily use U.S. labor and materials.

The senators, led by U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, introduced legislation requiring that economic stimulus funds only be spent on clean-energy projects that use materials made in the United States and that create a majority of jobs in America.

The four senators also asked Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to apply the so-called “Buy America” provision to all future energy projects funded under the Obama administration’s economic stimulus program.

The senators are attempting to require “Buy America” provisions after learning that 75 percent of the $2 billion spent on wind energy projects supported by the stimulus program reportedly went to foreign companies.

Schumer said that a $1.5 billion West Texas wind project using Chinese-built turbines would create 3,000 jobs in China and only 300 in the United States.

But the American Wind Energy Association, a trade group, harshly criticized the senators’ actions, saying that invoking the “Buy America” provision would “torpedo one of the most successful job creation efforts of the Recovery Act” by driving away foreign investment in U.S. wind farms.

Article appearing courtesy Yale Environment 360.

photo: Markusram

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The Obama administration is creating an office to coordinate and report the latest climate change data, a unit analogous to the National Weather Service that officials hope will help planners, businesses, and the public better understand and prepare for the effects of global warming.

The office, which will be part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, will assemble about 550 scientists already working on climate issues under one roof. All data will be accessible on a website, www.climate.gov.

“As the realities of climate change become more obvious to more people, farmers, businesses, government agencies and public health officials are going to be turning to us for credible, useful and relevant information,” said Jane Lubchenco, administrator of NOAA (picture above).

Lubchenco said that while the new office is not a response to recent controversies surrounding climate science and the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the government does want to build public confidence in the science and better explain what information is well-established and what research needs to be done.

Below, Lubchenco speaks about the challenges of tackling climate change in Oct. 2009.

Article appearing courtesy Yale Environment 360.

photo and video: Elsa Wenzel

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The U.S. Energy Secretary, Steven Chu, and a leading senator predicted that Congress will make good progress on climate legislation — and may even pass a bill — before a meeting in Copenhagen in December to forge an international treaty to slow global warming.

The remarks by Chu and Sen. Barbara Boxer of California were markedly more optimistic than those of President Obama’s chief climate and energy adviser, Carol Browner, who said 10 days ago that a U.S. climate bill would not be passed before Copenhagen.

Speaking to reporters in London, Chu said, “Whether there will be a bill on the president’s desk and he’ll sign it, I’m hopeful it will be… It will be tight, but there’s a good shot.” Boxer, one of two co-authors of a carbon cap-and-trade bill in the Senate, said the legislation would be passed by her committee soon, adding, “Certainly before Copenhagen, and we’re hoping maybe to even have it on the floor (of the Senate).”

Prospects for congressional passage of a bill placing a cap and a price on carbon emissions brightened over the weekend when a leading Republican senator, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, co-authored an op-ed article in the New York Times with Democratic Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts saying that he could support cap-and-trade legislation as long as it contained provisions encouraging the development of nuclear power and offshore oil.

Article appearing courtesy of Yale Environment 360.

[photo credit: Flickr]

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Slow down, high-speed rail seekers. In the race for stimulus money, the Obama administration has received applications from 24 states requesting $50 billion for high-speed rail projects, reports The New York Times.

That’s more than six times the amount of money designated. Joseph Szabo, head of the Federal Railroad Administration, told the Times that the selections will be merit based, and will be made this winter.

The Salt Lake Tribune reports that Utah Sen. Bob Bennett is involved in a fickle love affair with stimulus money. Two days before the Republican senator voted against the nearly $800 billion package – which he said would only stimulate the national debt – Bennett wrote to Energy Secretary Steven Chu asking him to pay special attention to a few projects in Utah. He wasn’t alone, reports the Tribune. All four of Utah’s Republicans in Congress voted against the bill, before using congressional stationery to try to nab a portion of the stimulus package for their state.Tax credits for companies that create jobs? Increasingly, economists and Washington officials are saying “Yes, please,” reports The New York Times. The federal government hasn’t tried it since the 1970s, but in the face of the highest unemployment rates in a generation, supporters are saying it may offer just enough incentive to get companies to hire new workers.

And finally, The Wall Street Journal reports that more than $270 million of stimulus money awarded by the Federal Aviation Administration has gone to low-priority projects. In fact, they are of such low priority, they fall below the threshold of projects that the FAA would typically weed out. We’ve reported on the FAA’s decision to fund low-priority projects with stimulus money, and on the inspector general’s blasting of the FAA for its stimulus-spending decisions.

Article by Sabrina Shankman appearing courtesy of ProPublica.

[photo credit: BakaOnigiri/WikiCommons]

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Some automotive entrepreneurs are feeling like when it comes to getting DOE funding, it’s who, not what you know.

The $2.4 billion in federal funding for advanced battery and vehicle electrification announced this week boosted battery manufacturers that had prior relationships with the DOE, while some lesser-known innovators were left with hat in hand.

Matt Mattila, a consultant in the Rocky Mountain Institute’s Mobility and Vehicle Efficiency Practice says the money “went to the old guard” and left out new EV companies such as Aptera where “$100 million could make or break them.”

Also missing out on funding were battery companies including Valence, Boston Power and Bright Automotive, a company spun out of RMI. The DOE’s funding philosophy was conservative, opting to forego many newer companies while providing funds to perennial research partners Ford, GM and Chrysler.

“There’s huge open space for new guys to make a move, and the funding could have done a lot to accelerate them,” Mattila said.

Felix Kramer of plug-in hybrid advocacy group CalCars.org says the Obama administration’s pledge of transparency and accountability in the allocating recovery program funds has not been completely fulfilled. Cramer wrote today that results so far have been mixed as

“the bulk of the awards went to large established companies — especially automakers and component suppliers.”

The DOE also provided funding not aimed at commercialization or reducing carbon emissions on a grand scale, but instead will share the cost of pilot projects to get a smaller number of plug-in and electric vehicles onto the roads that will result in temporary jobs.

General Motors received $30 million to put 125 Chevrolet Volts on the road; Ford got $30 million to deliver and test 150 plug-in Ford Escape Hybrids; Chrysler received $70 million to deploy 220 plug-in vans and trucks.

While $160 million may seem a lot to test less than 500 vehicles (by comparison, 1,000 professional green jobs could have been paid for), the trials are considered crucial to understanding the performance of the vehicles and the batteries so prior to commercialization, and to share the automaker’s steep development cost.

ECOtality, one of the oldest electric vehicle charging equipment manufacturers (10 years) will install 12,750 charging systems through its eTec subsidiary. The $100 million grant will create small vehicle networks in Portland and three other Oregon cities, three cities in Tennessee, and in Seattle, San Diego, Phoenix and Tucson.

This article originally appeared on Matter Network.

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