Michael Moynihan

NDN's Green Project has been incredibly active since its launch earlier this year.

Most recently, we held a series of events addressing climate change, energy and the economy. On July 9, U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, Chairman of the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, addressed the NDN community on the case for Cap and Trade; later that month, NDN's Globilization Initiative Chair Dr. Robert Shapiro released a paper on a carbon/payroll tax shift; at the end of July, we urged Congress to support a package of renewable tax credits; and on August 1, Assistant U.S. Senate Majority Leader Dick Durbin's delivered an important policy speech on the Green Economic Opportunity.

Today we are releasing a major new report which argues that solar power must become a top U.S. economic priority. To read the full report, click here.

The paper, which is summarized in a news release below, makes a compelling case as to why solar power will help address high fuel prices, combat climate change and reduce our dependence on foreign energy. While it may seem that all anyone talks about these days is offshore drilling, read this fact-filled report to find out why looking up instead of drilling down may be just what we need to do when it comes to creating a clean energy policy that will power our economy in the 21st century.

Accelerating the rollout of solar power must become a top policy priority of the United States if our nation is to address high fuel prices, combat climate change and reduce our dependence on foreign energy. So argues a new report entitled, “Solar Energy: The Case for Action," released today by NDN's Green Project and authored by Michael Moynihan, a former Clinton Administration official who now directs the Green Project.

As a growing global population and higher standards of living increase demand for energy, the report argues that energy has entered a new phase in its history.

NDN believes that solar will play a key role in creating green jobs while building the new, low-carbon economy of the 21st century and that promoting leadership in solar technologies to take advantage of this immense new opportunity must be a major policy priority of the United States.

"As recently as last week, the inability of Congress to extend the Solar Investment Tax Credit, at a time when American families are struggling with high energy prices and industries as diverse as autos and airlines are losing billions of dollars, shows that this issue requires far more attention than it has received,” Moynihan said.

Moynihan continued, "Our political leaders have been treating solar energy and other renewables as an interesting but sideline issue. In fact, the development of renewable energy sources is a vital economic priority of the United States. We cannot afford to sit idly by as higher energy prices continue to shift wealth from American families and businesses to energy producers overseas. We have the know-how and ingenuity and are missing only the determination to build a new, clean energy economy to power American prosperity."

To unleash the power of solar energy, the report makes the following recommendations:

Congress should extend the Investment Tax Credit for eight years, remove the cap on residential installations and extend the tax credit to utilities.

Congress should pass a renewable electricity standard with a solar set-aside.

Congress should step up funding for energy R&D.

Congress, regulators and stakeholders should carry out limited power industry reform that, among other goals, requires decoupling of power profits from production.

Congress should require net metering and so-called net billing for electricity.

Congress and state and local governments should create incentives for homebuyers to more easily finance homes that have solar power or install solar power.

Because renewable power will require better switching and efficiency to move power to where it is needed, government, utilities and other stakeholders should work together to modernize the grid.

NDN’s Green Project is a program of the Globalization Initiative that seeks to develop a legislative, regulatory and advocacy framework to address climate change, enhance energy security and accelerate the development of green technologies to promote economic growth. This initiative is designed to serve as a bridge between key stakeholders in the new clean technology community and public leaders to build the low-carbon economy of tomorrow.

For those heading to Netroots Nation, NDN will be conducting two panels Saturday afternoon. You can find more info here, which also includes a link to the Netroots Nation site for more information. I will be joined at one of the panels by our own Michael Moynihan, NDN's Green Project Director, and our good friend, editor of Democracy Journal, Andrei Cherny, for a panel about the future of U.S. foreign policy. I also will be presenting a brand new, up-to-date version of our compelling power point presentation, The Dawn of a New Politics, at the other session. Even if you have seen the old version, this one is new enough that it will be worth sitting through - again.

The visionary behind Netroots Nation, Gina Cooper, has put on another great show this year. NDN has stepped up its support of NN, and is now a major sponsor of the whole conference. I look forward to seeing old friends, and meeting new ones - as always happens at what has become one of the most important gatherings of left of center politics each year.

It is amazing how far the netroots has come in these last few years. I first met Markos, of Daily Kos, in the summer of 2003 when all this was just beginning, before the word "blog" appeared in our spell checkers. The expanded definition of the netroots now reaches many millions of people each week, making it easier for them to connect to politics, and allowing many more millions of people to be meaingfully involved in fighting for a better future for their country. It has brought much more vigorous debate and accountability to progressive politics, and I for one believe robust debate and discussion - and occassional fighting among friends - is a prerequisite for the success of any movement. There is so much more vitality, so much more debate, so many more voices, so many more people, so much more money and so much more passion in left of center politics today as a result of what we call the netroots.

Markos and I reflected on all this at a forum we held in San Francisco in April, which you can watch here. And you can find my foreword to "Crashing the Gate," the critically acclaimed book by Markos and Jerome Armstrong, here. It offers some thoughts on the rise of a new 21st century progressive politics.

Look forward to seeing you there!

Waking up to this morning's papers, I can't decide if it's worse to be someone who has to breathe or worse to be a spokesperson. I suppose I do both.

I usually don't blog about the environment. I leave that up to our Green Team and the incredibly whip-smart head of our Green Project, Michael Moynihan. You can read his much more technical and interesting blog posts here.

But, hey, I take my own bags to the grocery and recycle roughly the equivalent of a K2-sized mountain of Diet Coke cans (OK, and a few wine bottles) each week. So I have the street creds to write this blog.

So, down to the business at hand. Let me get this straight, because it's not easy. According to an article by the Washington Post's super sharp Juliet Eilperin (who has the somewhat crazy job of covering the weird, parallel universe beats of the envrionment and U.S. Sen. John McCain's presidential bid), the U.S. EPA was ordered sometime last year by the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS, if you want to be really hip) to determine whether greenhouse gases were bad. Duh. EPA at first issued a report from its scientists and staff, saying, yeah, they're pretty bad. They hurt humans who breathe the air (like, all of us) and contribute to global warming, also bad. But wait. President Bush, the consumate oil man, got other federal agencies like the U.S. Department of Agriculture (who knew USDA was such a bully?) to gang up on EPA and say that Western civilization as we know it would end if EPA did anything to help us breathe easier under the Clean Air Act. Best to punt to Congress, which recently failed itself to do anything. And in another bizarre twist, the EPA decided that although it announced its own findings were DOA the day they were announced, they would open up the proposal for public comment. WHAT? WHY BOTHER? That's like getting people to sign a guest book at a wedding then tossing it before the end of the reception.

So, is it worse to be human and have to breathe or worse to be a press secretary when you have to lie through your teeth? Which is exactly what White House flak Dana Perino did yesterday when she said acting on greenhouse gases and global warming would cause gas prices and home heating costs to go up. You go, girl. Play on those fears of the average family when you get paid a zillion dollars a year to spin away. Oh, but wait. She said we should we should invest in alternative fuels. I suppose she means drilling in ANWR, which would provide enough oil to keep us going for about a nanosecond.

But there is hope. NDN and the Green Project ACTUALLY do believe in exploring different ways to reduce pollution and increase output from alternative energy sources. That's why we are hosting a lunch next week with the head of our Globalization Initiative, Dr. Rob Shapiro, who has co-authored a thought provoking paper on a carbon tax that would reduce the payroll tax. That's why Michael is hard at work on what promises to be a compelling paper on why extending the solar tax credit is a legisative no-brainer and that's why we were thrilled earlier this week when U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, Chairman of the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, spoke to the NDN Community. You can read his very insightful comments here.

And to conclude (while I can still draw enough breath to type), a separate front-page article in the Washington Post had more bad news for those of us who can't hold our breath until we die. A federal appeals courth has thrown out a Bush Administration effort to reduce unhealthy levels of soot and smog (read: black junk in the air that coats your lungs) because the court said EPA had overstepped its bounds. Call me zany, but if EPA itsn't supposed to reduce black crud in the air, what is it supposed to do?

So, in sum, we have the White House reject policy in favor of politics. The losers: humans who breathe. We have a White House press secretary who added considerable amounts of her own hot air into the atmosphere (bad). The losers: humans who breathe. And to top off this stellar day, we have a federal appeals court who thinks the EPA shouldn't do anything more than give awards to 5th graders who win the local science fair. The losers: humans who breathe.

As a human being and press secretary, I am ashamed. I have to go now. I'm feeling a little short of breath.