EPA ‘Lost the Messaging War’

Lisa Jackson, who heads the Environmental Protection Agency, went to the National Press Club today to make the Obama administration’s case that environmental regulation, such as reducing carbon emissions, would be good for the economy.

The notion that America must choose between protecting the environment and growing the economy is a “false choice,” she said.

“Smart environmental protection creates jobs,” Jackson said.

It creates “a market for clean technology, and then drives innovation and invention—in other words, new products for that market,” she said.

Increased fuel efficiency standards for automobiles, for example, will lead to advanced battery technology and innovations in composite materials to make cars lighter, she said.

Once a price is put on carbon, investments in alternative energy development in the U.S. would increase, Jackson contended.

“We need to reclaim leadership in the development of new products that protect our health and our environment,” Jackson said. “And we need to capitalize on the growing green marketplace here and around the world.”

Other countries have surged ahead of the U.S. in clean energy technology. A study issued last week by the Apollo Alliance noted that the U.S. is importing about 70 percent of its renewable energy systems and components.

“If that trend continues, we stand to lose out on an estimated 100,000 clean energy manufacturing jobs by 2015, and nearly 250,000 by 2030,” said Phil Angelides, chairman of the alliance.

The economic-stimulus bill includes tax credits and other measures aimed at jump-starting manufacturing of clean energy technologies in the U.S., but many of the recipients also are investing in wind and solar manufacturing projects overseas as well.

“Some recipients are putting their primary emphasis on low-wage production for the entire global market,” said Philip Mattera, research director for Good Jobs First, which worked with the Apollo Alliance on its study.

Their report recommends that manufacturing tax credits for clean energy projects in the U.S. be expanded, but contend provisions should be added to recover the value of the credits if the recipients end up moving jobs overseas.

Jackson, meanwhile, concedes that business groups that oppose caps on carbon emissions have done a good job of scaring people about the impact of these limits on the economy. Many electric utilities burn coal, and carbon caps would make electricity produced by coal power plants more expensive.

“We’ve lost the messaging war,” she said.

There’s little chance the Senate will pass legislation this year that would impose caps on carbon emissions and establish a system for trading carbon credits—the approach taken by the House in the bill it passed last year. The EPA has said it would regulate carbon emissions through the Clean Air Act if Congress doesn’t address the issue, but Jackson said, “We need Congress to act.”

The best chance for that to happen is a compromise approach being developed by Senators John Kerry, Joe Lieberman, and Lindsey Graham. These senators are backing off from an economy-wide cap-and-trade approach, instead working sector-by-sector on strategies to reduce carbon emissions. Their legislation also will call for increasing domestic production of energy, including nuclear power and offshore drilling for oil and natural gas.

The senators are talking with the business community, including electric utility executives and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in hopes of getting them on board, according to a report in The Hill newspaper today.

Pressure from environmentally conscious consumers have led many companies to support caps on carbon emissions, which most climate scientists believe have been a major factor in global warming. But some business lobbyists have challenged the science behind this theory.

Jackson said it’s time for these lobbyists to “stop playing the politics of delay and denial.”

---

Kent Hoover is the Washington bureau chief for bizjournals.