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Earth Day Clean Energy Agenda

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By the Earth Day Network

s we approach the 21st century, Earth Day Network is launching a global campaign to bring about a swift transition to clean, renewable energy sources and a giant leap forward in energy efficiency.

Environmental realities compel us to evaluate our outdated energy path. Cutting edge technologies offer us a better choice.

Public policies that promote these clean technologies and reward responsible energy choices are the bridge to our clean, renewable energy future.

Our use of highly polluting fossil fuels, especially coal and oil, causes air pollution, acid rain, cancer, and other damage to human health and the environment. Burning fossil fuels also threatens us with global warming, potentially the most serious environmental crisis our planet has ever faced.

We can reduce the threat of global warming, create jobs and protect our air and water by moving rapidly toward a clean, renewable energy economy. By cutting energy waste and investing in solar, wind, and other clean energy sources, we can meet our energy needs and achieve long-term energy security without risking our own health and the health of the Earth.

We support responsible public policies that:

1) Accelerate the transition to clean, renewable energy sources.

2) Encourage and reward more efficient use of energy by utilities, vehicles, appliances, homes, buildings and businesses.

3) Level the playing field for renewable technologies by ending public policies that keep the price of outdated energy sources artificially low.

4) Demonstrate leadership in international efforts to reduce the pollution that causes global warming.

Highlights

1) Accelerate the transition to clean, renewable energy sources.

• Over the next decade, triple the amount of energy harnessed from clean, renewable sources such as the wind and sun.
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• Increase government research and development funding for clean fuels, hydrogen fuel cells, and renewable electric generation technologies, and establish market incentives to boost their use.
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• Enact public policies that enable utilities to invest in renewable energy without putting themselves at a competitive disadvantage.
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• Set a responsible standard for a minimum renewable energy content for automotive fuels.
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• Shift World Bank and other international funding toward renewable energy and energy efficiency projects in developing nations.

2) Encourage and reward more efficient use of energy by utilities, vehicles, homes, appliances, buildings and businesses.

• Provide incentives to commercialize and deploy highly efficient energy technologies that minimize waste.
  .
• Set higher fuel-efficiency standards so cars will go further on a gallon of gas.
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• Close the auto fuel efficiency loophole that allows sports utility vehicles (SUVs) to produce far more global warming pollution than cars.

3) Level the playing field for renewable technologies by ending public policies that keep the price of outdated energy sources artificially low.

• Close the Clean Air Act loophole that allows older coal-fired power plants to pollute far more than newer plants, and set progressively tighter limits on power plants' total carbon, nitrogen, sulfur and mercury pollution.
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• Shift international energy funding in the developing world from outdated energy production methods (coal, large hydro, and oil) to clean, renewable energy technologies.
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• End taxpayer subsidies that artificially lower the price of coal, oil, and nuclear power.
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• Increase the accountability of the nuclear industry by removing the limits on liability for nuclear accidents.
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• Protect environmentally sensitive public lands from oil drilling and coal and uranium mining.
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• Provide adequate resources and job training for workers and communities now dependent on dated energy resources, to ensure that they achieve a just transition to a sustainable energy economy.

4) Demonstrate leadership in international efforts to reduce the pollution that causes global warming.

• Provide scientific and technical leadership in efforts to meet global energy needs with sources that do not contribute to global warming.
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• Ratify, implement, and work to strengthen the Kyoto Protocol, the international agreement to reduce global warming pollution.
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• Develop and implement federal, state and local action plans to decrease global warming pollution.
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• Lead by example, by implementing this Clean Energy Agenda.

For more information about the Clean Energy Agenda and the Earth Day 2000 energy campaign, visit http://www.earthday.net. Earth Day Network, 91 Marion St., Seattle, WA 98104. Phone: 206-264-0114. FAX: 206-682-1184.

-- From The Earth Day Network

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