Apollo Alliance Praises Obama’s First Hundred Days
CONTACT: Sam Haswell: (415) 371-1700 x201
SAN FRANCISCO – Phil Angelides, chairman of the Apollo Alliance, today released the following statement congratulating President Barack Obama on a successful first hundred days in office:
“The Apollo Alliance congratulates President Obama on a whirlwind start to his presidency. Despite inheriting dual wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, a full-blown economic meltdown, a cratering housing market and a crumbling energy infrastructure, the president is delivering on the promise of his historic campaign and has already established himself as a thoughtful, steady leader at home and abroad.
“The economy and our country’s fossil fuel addiction are far and away the president’s biggest domestic challenges, and he’s met both head on. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act represented a significant down payment on the country’s transition to a new, clean energy economy. Nearly $113 billion will be spent over the next two years on developing clean fuels, modernizing rail transit, pursuing energy efficiency, and developing ultra-fuel-efficient vehicles. All of these endeavors will create jobs and move us toward energy independence.
“The Apollo Alliance supports the president’s agenda, and we urge him to stay focused on building a solid foundation for the new economy based on clean energy. America still needs a long-term economic growth strategy that focuses on energy efficiency, rebuilding the U.S. manufacturing sector to meet the clean energy needs of the future, preparing a green-collar workforce, and transitioning to a clean-energy, low-carbon economy.
“If his first hundred days are any indication, President Obama is up to the task.”
The Apollo Alliance is a coalition of labor, business, environmental and community leaders working to catalyze a clean energy revolution that will put millions of Americans to work in a new generation of high-quality, green-collar jobs.
For more information, visit ApolloAlliance.org.
Flambeau River’s Pilot Biomass Plant Turns White to Green
When Smart Paper, the local paper mill in Park Falls, Wisconsin, shut down in February 2006 more than 300 workers in a town of just 2,700 found themselves without jobs. The mill was Park Falls’ largest employer, but the rising cost of natural gas forced it to go bankrupt like countless other mills dying nationwide.
Apollo Alliance Rebuffs Sen. Bond’s Bogus Green Jobs Report
Apollo Chairman Phil Angelides Says Inaction Won’t Fix Nation’s Economic Woes
SAN FRANCISCO – Phil Angelides, chairman of the Apollo Alliance, today released the following statement challenging claims made by Sen. Kit Bond (R-Mo.) on green job creation in his report Yellow Light on Green Jobs:
“Senator Bond must still be under the impression that the fundamentals of America’s economy are strong. While the country continues to hemorrhage jobs by the millions, Senator Bond is busy attacking the nation’s most promising solution for strengthening the domestic workforce and finally securing our energy independence.
“The Apollo Alliance’s New Apollo Program, in addition to being a job creation strategy, is also a blueprint for the transition from the old economy to a new economy based on clean energy. Rather than take Senator Bond’s approach and sit idly by in the hope that the country’s energy and economic woes magically sort themselves out, we believe the time is now for aggressive solutions that will put Americans back to work, break our costly addiction to fossil fuels, and lay the foundation of a new, robust economic infrastructure.
“This country needs a comprehensive approach that will not only increase demand for clean energy, but meet it with American workers making the clean energy parts and components of the future. With proper investments in workforce training, the domestic clean-energy manufacturing sector offers the chance to strengthen and expand the country’s middle class with jobs that provide benefits and pay an average of $25,000 more per years than service sector jobs. If we act now, we can create the type of family-supporting jobs this country sorely needs, and begin to reclaim the millions of jobs we’ve been losing overseas.
“Senator Bond can obfuscate and misrepresent facts all he wants, but what it comes down to is this: the cost of inaction will be far greater than the cost of investing in America’s clean energy economy.”
The Apollo Alliance is a coalition of labor, business, environmental and community leaders working to catalyze a clean energy revolution that will put millions of Americans to work in a new generation of high-quality, green-collar jobs.
For more information, visit ApolloAlliance.org.
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Calling on Government’s Energy Top Cats
Bringing home the message about making the transition to a clean energy, good jobs economy often means bringing the message into the “homes” of the people who make the decisions. This month the national Apollo Alliance and a number of our state and local affiliates did just that by visiting with some of the key lawmakers and their staffs in their home Congressional district offices in six important manufacturing states.
The Congressional outreach coincided with the launch this month of Make It In America: The Apollo Green Manufacturing Action Plan, a comprehensive national strategy to scale up production of American-made clean energy systems and components, making U.S. factories more energy efficient, and generating family-supporting green-collar jobs.
Though it was a month-long effort, much of the national outreach project occurred during the two-week Congressional recess that ended this week. The visits demonstrated that the Apollo Alliance has reach from outside the Beltway, and from coast to coast. In other words, we were intent on showing the geographical breadth and depth of knowledge of the Apollo affiliates network across the country.
In Oregon, we visited with Senator Jeff Merkley and his staff; in Michigan with Representative John Dingell (see pix above) and with the staff of Senator Debbie Stabenow. Senator Boxer met with the California Apollo Alliance. In Ohio, a good portion of the state delegation and their staffs sat down with our Ohio Apollo Alliance members, including Representatives John A. Boccieri, Michael Turner, Timothy Ryan, Zachary T. Space, Mary Jo Kilroy and Steven C. LaTourette, as well as with Senator Sherrod Brown. The Ohio Apollo Alliance also had discussions before the recess with aides in the offices of Representative Betty Sutton and Rep. Marcia Fudge. The Wisconsin Apollo Alliance visited with Representative Tammy Baldwin.
The New York Apollo Alliance met with the staff of Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and with freshman Representative Paul D. Tonko, who chaired the state Assembly Energy Committee for 15 years, then became the president of the New York Energy Research and Development Authority. New York’s manufacturing sector has been declining for four years, with devastating impact to working families. But there’s a bright spot, one of the largest wind farms east of the Mississippi River, involving some 200 turbines, was recently installed in the hills near Lake Ontario, using steel towers manufactured in Vietnam that were shipped halfway around the world.
In Oregon, Barbara Byrd, the Secretary-Treasurer of the Oregon AFL-CIO and an active member of the Oregon Apollo Alliance, said the meeting with Senator Merkley’s staff – State Director Jon Isaacs, Labor Liaison Ed Hall, and Maribeth Healey – went well. “Senator Merkley is a long time advocate for clean energy and jobs, and this focus has become even more important to him since he was elected to office in November. We had a good conversation about the Apollo Alliance, the New Apollo Program, and the activities of Oregon Apollo. “We shared some of Apollo’s publications with them. “
“As a result of the meeting, I was invited to visit with Senator Merkley’s staff in Washington DC, and was able to provide the senator with information on Apollo’s push to make sure green jobs are good jobs. I was also able to provide concrete examples of how good green jobs are being created in Oregon, citing the work of several of our Oregon Apollo partners. As follow-up, we have been asked to work with the Senator’s staff on a June event in Portland that will focus on the creation of good green jobs for the state, and will feature Senator Merkley as our keynote speaker.”
Apollo Alliance Television Ad Calls on Senator George Voinovich To Keep Clean Energy Jobs in America
SAN FRANCISCO – The Apollo Alliance will release a television ad in Ohio tomorrow calling on Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) to support “Make it in America” clean energy manufacturing provisions in upcoming energy and climate legislation. The ad is part of Apollo’s broad-based campaign to create and keep millions of new jobs in the U.S. by rebuilding the country’s manufacturing capacity to meet the clean energy needs of the future.
Ohio, once home to a thriving manufacturing base, has experienced a steep decline in manufacturing employment over the past two decades, much of which has been attributed to jobs going overseas. The current recession has accelerated the downward trend, as more than 100,000 of the state’s manufacturing jobs have disappeared since December 2007. Apollo’s ad, which will begin airing statewide on Wednesday, April 22, urges Sen. Voinovich to support efforts by Congress to ramp up investments in the domestic manufacture of clean energy parts and components – a move that would revitalize the manufacturing sector and broadly benefit Ohio. MoveOn.org has expressed interest in broadening the scope of the ad to reach congressional members across the country with a strong clean energy, good jobs message.
“We can’t let the next generation of energy jobs be in oil fields on the other side of the world,” said Apollo Alliance Chairman Phil Angelides. “America’s energy security and economic revitalization depend on creating and keeping good jobs in the America. With its existing industrial resources and ready-made workforce, Ohio is poised to lead the country’s transition to a clean energy economy. We strongly urge Senator Voinovich to support a domestic green jobs bill that will help put Ohioans back to work in well-paying, clean-energy jobs.”
Last week, Apollo Alliance released its Green Manufacturing Action Plan (GreenMAP), which detailed aggressive steps to scale up production of American-made clean energy systems and components while making U.S. factories more energy efficient. Over the next several weeks, Apollo’s national coalition of business, labor, environmental and community leaders will lead a multi-state advertising and advocacy campaign calling for federal investments to enable domestic manufacturers to meet the nation’s demand for clean energy solutions.
Developed in collaboration with industry, labor, environmental groups, and academic experts, the Apollo GreenMAP calls for:
- Direct federal funding for clean energy manufacturers to retool facilities and retrain workers to develop, produce and commercialize clean energy technologies.
- Tying federal support to manufacturers’ ability to meet labor and “Made in America” content standards.
- Federal support to streamline the clean energy components supply chain to make American producers more competitive.
- Increased federal Green Jobs Act funding to enable the American workforce to meet the demands of a clean energy economy.
- Creation of a Presidential Task Force on Clean Energy Manufacturing to coordinate the federal government’s efforts and increase our international competitiveness.
For more information on the Apollo GreenMAP is available.
Vision Energy’s $1 Billion Wind Bet in Illinois
Residents of Kankakee County, Illinois are ready for the new clean energy economy. Inspired by the calls for more green jobs during the 2008 presidential campaign, a local group of business, education, and government leaders is working to make green-collar jobs a reality in their region. They recognize the potential for green-collar jobs to transform the local economy while also benefitting the country and the environment. They also see investment in wind energy as the wave of Kankakee’s clean energy future.
Community-Owned Is Business Model for Two Wind Farms in Iowa
The farmland of Iowa’s Emmet and Dickinson counties will soon be home to the nation’s two largest community-owned wind farms. Red Rock Wind Energy LLC and Emmet County Energy LLC, both based in Estherville, Iowa, announced in December their intent build 300 and 200-megawatt wind arrays respectively near Estherville, a northwest Iowa agricultural community of 6,000 residents east of Sioux Falls near the border with Minnesota.
Pilkington Looks Through Its Glass to the Sun
Two years ago Pilkington, a multinational manufacturer that’s one of the world’s biggest producers of building and automotive glass, entered the new energy economy. The company developed a solar glass line and began supplying photovoltaic panel makers.
Apollo Weeky Update 4/17/09: Manufacturing Action Plan Launch, Greening of Southie
In December 2007 Congress passed the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, which sought, for the first time, to address two of the three primary economic challenges of the century: energy security and climate change. Among other measures, the law promoted clean energy alternatives and established a green-collar job training program developed by the Apollo Alliance. The act also provided grants and loans to manufacturers to retool plants for clean energy products, encouraged higher mileage vehicles (particularly plug-in electric hybrids) and renewable fuels, increased energy efficiency standards in appliances, declared that all government buildings must significantly reduce their reliance on fossil fuels, and required that new government buildings be carbon-neutral by 2030.
Make It In America: The Apollo Green Manufacturing Action Plan
SAN FRANCISCO - The Apollo Alliance today launched a broad-based campaign to restore millions of American jobs with the release of a comprehensive roadmap for rebuilding U.S. manufacturing capacity to meet the clean energy needs of the future. Read more
