Van Jones has sure come out punching like a love warrior. He is debating Andrew Morriss at Economist.com. He is arguing that creating green jobs is part of the government’s responsibility. Morriss argues that only the market should dictate. It’s a really interesting debate. Check it out here: http://bit.ly/dgs3EJ
In one of his first appearances since returning to the Center for American Progress, senior fellow Van Jones told attendees of the CAP-Apollo Alliance conference, “Picking a Winner: How to Make the U.S. a Leader in the Clean Energy Economy,” that we now know that the clean energy economy is coming. There are “three key questions that need to be addressed” about the emerging clean energy economy, Jones said, that need to be addressed, but only two already have a “robust policy discussion.
video after the jump.
… Continue Reading
The NAACP, the oldest and most powerful Civil Rights organization in America, is going to Honor former Green Czar Van Jones with an Image Award. The NAACP is stating that he is a pioneer in the “green collar jobs” with movement. This well deserved award is so ironic as roughly 6 months ago, Fox News Anchor Glenn Beck single handedly caused a furor within the conservative right community that led to Mr. Jones Resignation. Beck took a series of Van’s remarks out of context and blew them out of proportion, leading to unwanted negative attention on the newly appoint ‘czar’ on green economy.
Where the irony lies is that the NAACP Image Awards are aired each year by the Fox Network, and is a prestigious awards show that honors the achievements of people of color and their allies for advancements in the areas, of Music, Movies, Social justice and Civil rights!!! I am sure that Glenn Beck sat in astonishment as the NAACP announced that Van Jones would be receiving the Presidents Award. The Presidents Award is the most prestigious award handed out at the NAACP Image Awards and has been awarded to others such as President Bill Clinton, Muhammad Ali and Ruby Dee just to name a few. Awarding Mr. Jones an award such as this directly counteracts the damage that Glenn Beck and other conservatives have to leverage on many progressives that President Obama has placed in his administration.
Many in the movement, those who fight for green collar jobs, environmental and climate justice and all other aspects of the green movement, felt betrayed and hurt by the resignation of Mr. Jones as their one ally that they trusted left them in the dust. Yet in the end, justice comes full circle the very same network that worked to lead Jones to his resignation will also be showing his return to Glory!!! Don’t you just love Karma? Maybe Glen Beck and others will realize that you can’t keep a “ Good Man Down”!!!!
In addition to Mr. Jones receipt of the Image Award, Mr. Jones will also be joining Princeton and the Center for American Progress. This is return to glory for Mr. Jones, and I cannot wait to see how he will continue to fight for the underserved in his new endeavors. Please tune in on Friday February 26th at 8pm on FOX network to watch the 41st NAACP Awards, and the rise of one of America’s Brightest and most influential minds today.
Trash would be converted into electricity at Project Apollo, a renewable energy project proposed for Milwaukee’s north side, developers said Tuesday.
Alliance Federated Energy announced plans to develop a $225 million renewable energy plant that would create 250 construction jobs and 45 full-time jobs. The first phase of the project is expected to be running by 2013.
The plant would use technology developed by Westinghouse Plasma Corp. of Madison, Pa., to convert the waste at high heat into a synthetic gas, or syngas. That, in turn, could be used as a fuel to generate power.
story jacked from Jsonline.com
The first phase of the renewable energy facility is expected to process about 1,200 tons of municipal and industrial waste per day. That would generate 25 megawatts of electricity, or enough to power roughly 20,000 typical homes, according to Alliance Federated Energy. A second phase is envisioned that would generate another 25 megawatts of power, company spokesman Josh Morby said.
Alliance is a Milwaukee-based company that focuses on developing and financing renewable energy projects. The company was founded in 2005, and Apollo is its first announced project.
Follow all of Jayme’s copenhagen coverage at http://youngvoter.org/cop15
Cold, Snowing, 100’s of police, 1000’s of marchers, banners, Amerie on the radio…
Angry, frustrated, trains shut down, young, old, global climate movement.
All words used to describe my experience at the Reclaim Power protest. While folks in the U.S. were safely tucked in their beds, thousands of young people from around the world gathered in the streets of Copenhagen to demand access to the Bella (convention) Center. To demand real policies that will reverse climate change and save planet earth.
It saddened me to see a man, eyes fire-red from being peppered sprayed, snot hanging from his nose, talking about how all he wanted was to have his voice heard. It was at that moment that reality set in. There are millions of people around the world already suffering from climate change. Their frustration is not unlike the thousands of displaced workers in Milwaukee looking for something to put them back to work. These protesters were just trying to express what they know to be right, but don’t have access to do so.
From my viewpoint, the world is going to hell in a handbasket. Global warming, increasing unemployment, and escalating wars all the while people around the world are crying, “enough!” And our leaders can’t let go long enough to listen and figure out a way to push the stop button. This, like so many other similar experiences, come down to the same thing…POWER.
No matter how disempowered I might feel right now, I will be up tomorrow to do it all again.
This is a few days old i.e. another epoch in internetz time but I bet when society crashes and we burn our laptops for plastic scented warmth, we’ll kill for the chance to 
one more snarky blog post, to tag one more pic of the person we were before Nature takes our headphones off and smacks us back to the Ice Age.
By which I mean, is anyone really surprised that not only do we have to confront the awesome, shame-on-us specter of global destruction as a simple truth – we are consuming the world, will we do anything about it? – but also as a classic opportunity for government conspiracy, what we don’t know will kill us, of course the Man is savvy to the fact that famine and hedonism are mutually exclusive and you’ll catch more of us flies if you act like the honey is gonna flowwwww forever.
Turns out “[t]he world is much closer to running out of oil than official estimates admit,” with the United States quite specifically called out for encouraging a false representation of 1.) how much oil is undiscovered [how do they know?!] and 2.) how much we’ve got left in our fields.
Consensus is growing that this roller coaster we call Life™ is already over the hump, we’re hurtling down hill to a NEW epoch the people at the Center for Egregiously Named Memetics call Peak Oil. When you hit Peak Oil, your oil production enters a phase called “terminal decline….” yeah, it looks kinda like this:
We tend to do a lot of talking here about greening yourself. Let’s face it, it’s not easy.
A lot of the time, people perceive greening their lifestyles as difficult, financially cumbersome with negligible returns. To reverse a societal norm is damn near impossible, so we’ve got our work cut out for us. This raises an eternally interesting question, however. Does working in an ecofriendly workplace or a green job help one develop a greener personality?
According to a recent NY Times blog, there seems to be no conducive evidence as of yet – research is still relatively new on the subject – but there are many case studies of this actually happening. Take – for instance – a graduate of Solar Richmond, Wayne Gatlin:
“I’m getting greener,” said Mr. Gatlin, who earns far more as a photovoltaics installer for the Berkeley-based Sun Light & Power than he did working security or selling shoes at an Adidas retail store.
“I recycle now,” Mr. Gatlin said. “I ride my bike. This was stuff I wouldn’t do before.”
I can personally say that ever since starting to work at 99Problems.org and The League, I’ve been trying to green my lifestyle with little things: using public transportation whenever possible, bringing my lunch to work in plastic containers rather than paper bags, trying to buy sustainable products… things like that.
What about you? Is your work life conducive to a greener lifestyle?
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