Jump Starting the Green Economy
6 Steps the new president can take to jump start the Green Economy and Main Street:
1. Create a domestic floor on wholesale gasoline and diesel prices, indexed to inflation, and reinvest all the tax proceeds in Energy Efficiency Projects, Grid Modernization and Expansion, a Nationwide Natural Gas Refueling Network for Trucks and Fleet Vehicles, and a vehicle rebate program targeting electrification of the transportation sector. Further declines in oil prices will endanger U.S. national security, undermine both private and public investments in renewable energy, and increase both criteria pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. The tax should be labeled the "National Security Energy fee," and U.S. exporters would receive an offsetting export credit based on the petroleum content of their export products.
2. Establish a price for Carbon throughout the U.S. economy, and negotiate international agreements with our trading partners that incorporate the price of Carbon in imports from countries that do not cap carbon emissions.
3. Create a federal Sustainability Initiative that merges preventive health care with efforts to reduce toxins in air, water, food, consumer products, and the workplace. The initiative would encourage aggressive assertion of federal, state, and local government's ownership and property rights over Coastal Waters, Public Lakes, Rivers, and the Common Atmosphere, and implement pollution fees that represent conservative estimates of economic and health damages attributable to pollution. Revenue from pollution fees would be offset by reductions in corporate income and other business taxes. Interstate and international shipments of food and certain consumer products would also be defined as "Pollution Carriers" and subject to more aggressive government inspection, and testing for pesticide residues, toxic metals, trans fatty acids, biological contaminants, and be appropriately labeled. Food shipments exceeding certain federal limits for toxins would be banned. Fees based on weight of biomass would be levied to pay for the food regulatory regime.
4. Create New Internet Banks with virtual presence in all 50 states that would be modeled after ING, and target Energy Infrastructure, Clean Transportation, and Energy Efficiency. The federal government would invest $50 billion in senior preferred stock in the new banks, which would eventually seek additional private equity to match the federal contribution. New banks would be more likely to lend out their reserves, adopt best practices in their systems and business process, and would be free of the burdens of legacy losses from the recent boom to bust cycle.
5. Implement a Sustainable Foreign and Trade Policy initiative that would work with trading partners to reduce or eliminate fossil fuel price subsidies in developing countries and Oil Exporters, slow and eventually halt development of conventional coal fired electricity generation (without Carbon Capture and Sequestration), curb illegal processing of e-Waste, and implement a Global Standard for Environmental Labeling that captures the carbon intensity and sustainability of global exports.
6. Implement a Sustainable Farming Initiative in the U.S. that would provide incentives for food and fuel crop production and processing methods that are both cost effective and have lower carbon, pollution, and water footprints. Agricultural subsidies would be adjusted to encourage Sustainable farm practices with respect to Carbon, Water, and Energy Intensity.
1. Create a domestic floor on wholesale gasoline and diesel prices, indexed to inflation, and reinvest all the tax proceeds in Energy Efficiency Projects, Grid Modernization and Expansion, a Nationwide Natural Gas Refueling Network for Trucks and Fleet Vehicles, and a vehicle rebate program targeting electrification of the transportation sector. Further declines in oil prices will endanger U.S. national security, undermine both private and public investments in renewable energy, and increase both criteria pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. The tax should be labeled the "National Security Energy fee," and U.S. exporters would receive an offsetting export credit based on the petroleum content of their export products.
2. Establish a price for Carbon throughout the U.S. economy, and negotiate international agreements with our trading partners that incorporate the price of Carbon in imports from countries that do not cap carbon emissions.
3. Create a federal Sustainability Initiative that merges preventive health care with efforts to reduce toxins in air, water, food, consumer products, and the workplace. The initiative would encourage aggressive assertion of federal, state, and local government's ownership and property rights over Coastal Waters, Public Lakes, Rivers, and the Common Atmosphere, and implement pollution fees that represent conservative estimates of economic and health damages attributable to pollution. Revenue from pollution fees would be offset by reductions in corporate income and other business taxes. Interstate and international shipments of food and certain consumer products would also be defined as "Pollution Carriers" and subject to more aggressive government inspection, and testing for pesticide residues, toxic metals, trans fatty acids, biological contaminants, and be appropriately labeled. Food shipments exceeding certain federal limits for toxins would be banned. Fees based on weight of biomass would be levied to pay for the food regulatory regime.
4. Create New Internet Banks with virtual presence in all 50 states that would be modeled after ING, and target Energy Infrastructure, Clean Transportation, and Energy Efficiency. The federal government would invest $50 billion in senior preferred stock in the new banks, which would eventually seek additional private equity to match the federal contribution. New banks would be more likely to lend out their reserves, adopt best practices in their systems and business process, and would be free of the burdens of legacy losses from the recent boom to bust cycle.
5. Implement a Sustainable Foreign and Trade Policy initiative that would work with trading partners to reduce or eliminate fossil fuel price subsidies in developing countries and Oil Exporters, slow and eventually halt development of conventional coal fired electricity generation (without Carbon Capture and Sequestration), curb illegal processing of e-Waste, and implement a Global Standard for Environmental Labeling that captures the carbon intensity and sustainability of global exports.
6. Implement a Sustainable Farming Initiative in the U.S. that would provide incentives for food and fuel crop production and processing methods that are both cost effective and have lower carbon, pollution, and water footprints. Agricultural subsidies would be adjusted to encourage Sustainable farm practices with respect to Carbon, Water, and Energy Intensity.
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