StrivinToBeGreen.com

I am pleased to announce that the House narrowly passed the energy-climate bill today. It is long over due and a great relief that we have achieved it. In 2006 before I was aware of the rising leadership of Mr. Obama, I signed onto the group of Americans who were urging Al Gore to run for President. In fact my “Gore 2008″ bumper sticker still resides on the back on my vehicle. As events of the political season began to reveal themseves, I realized that Al Gore had a bigger stage on which to address the quality of our environment. Nevertheless it is through his inspiration I do believe that we, yes we did it along with President Obama’s commitment to this very important need.

I’m not entirely sure why the Republicans are opposed to cap-and-trade on green house emissions. It creates a commoduty, that is pollution credits that energy companies can trade among each other and even be bought and sold in similar fashion to the stock market. The bottom line to it is that it works. I attended a Democracy For America event in Grand Rapids, MI a few years ago where a well established scientist described how it works, and how it works well. Without the cap on greenhouse emissions we are not solving anything. But Europe has proven that with cap-and-trade, it works.

Rep. John Boehner, the House Republican leader, claims that the climate change bill would cost jobs, depress real estate prices and put the government into parts of the economy where it now has no role. What Mr Boehner fails to realize is that we are running out of oil and if we do not reduce consumption the price of energy is going to go up anyway. Real estate prices are already in a slump and jobs, well how low can we go considering how many people are already unemployed?

In my state, Michigan, Unisolar Ovonic makes solar panels. They cannot keep up with the demand for them and guess what, the larger share of their market is in exports to other countries. Once the Energy-Climate Bill is signed into law by President Obama it will begin to create even more jobs in the sustainable energy sector and through the increase in volume we will start to see the products using this technology go down in price. This bill is not a tax increase as the naysayers claim. It is an investment in our nation that will make us become energy independent from big oil and OPEC nations who do not always have our best interests in mind. And the rewards in growth income in this sector will create jobs that will allow states and local municipalities to once again be able to fund the local services they’ve had to cut… cuts by the way that were made due to the loss of revenues from tax cuts that supposedly were designed to create jobs. We tried disinvesting in our nation and we are seeing the results all around us with high unemployment rates and cuts in local fire and police departments. It’s time to re-invest and begin to regrow our economy again.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 28, 2009

One Day for One Earth Campaign Seeks Two Thousand and Nine Twitter Followers

Oprah, and Ashton Kutcher have reached the 1 million mark for twitter followers, but one man has a more modest goal, 2,009 twitter followers for his environmental web site by June 5th.

June 5, 2009 is the day the United Nations hosts events to raise awareness of the environment and to promote policy changes that will help us all to be more earth friendly. It’s called World Environmental Day. And if at least two-thousand and nine people become twitter followers of the StrivinToBeGreen.com by World Environmental Day, founder and producer of the site, JD Sullivan says that he’ll make a contribution to Trees For the Future for 2,009 trees to be planted.

As is right now StrivinToBeGreen.com is set up to feature green jobs and articles of interest to green living. But this is just the first phase of a project that will eventually feature videos and product placement opportunities for companies who can offer green products.

“Overall, I want people to know that they don’t have to be perfect to be environmentally friendly,” says Sullivan, “Maybe two-thousand and nine trees doesn’t seem like much, but it represents the fact that by doing simple things we can still make a difference.”

If you wish to become a twitter follower of the web site, you can follow @strivin2begreen

Green collar jobs are defined as jobs directly involved in generating or supporting a firm’s green-related products or services. The green economy is defined as being comprised of industries that provide products or services in five areas: agriculture and natural resource conservation, clean transportation and fuels, increased energy efficiency, pollution prevention or environmental cleanup, and renewable energy production.

Green jobs pay well. Thirteen of the top 15 sectors of green employment have weekly wages above the overall private sector weekly average. And a variety of stakeholders, including business, education and training, labor, environmental, community and faith-based partners are coming together to work on various facets of creating a green economy, which offers the hop of jobs on the horizon and even now.

Green jobs focus on ending our nation’s dependence on foreign oil and in the process create good-paying jobs in the process. Some states uniquely positioned to diversify their economy and create jobs by growing the renewable energy sector.

Green Collar Investments that area creating jobs include:
Bringing together business, labor, government and educational leaders who share interest and expertise in a specific green sector to develop specific training programs for jobs in these green industries;

Investing in community colleges, universities, and training facilities to build their capacity to develop and provide training for green jobs and providing tuition for individuals who wish to pursue approved green-jobs training programs at colleges and universities.

In Michigan alone a Green Jobs Report, demonstrates the potential for green jobs in Michigan. At present Michigan boasts 109,067 private sector green jobs with the growth increasing since 2005. Among the renewable energy production firms in that sample, the growth rate hit 30 percent during that time period.

Green Collar Jobs Search:

A few million years ago humans invented the wheel. Only about a century ago we figured out how to propel wheels by burning fossil fuels. But today we are seeing some problems associated with the burning of fossil fuels. Dependence on foreign sources of oil has made the United States more vulnerable to the whims of OPEC nations which account for 35% of the world’s oil production. It has been demonstrated that the burning of fossil fuels has contributed to global warming which is having a devastating impact on our planet and its inhabitants.

The simplest, quickest and most effective way, at least in the short term, to reduce our use of oil is by increasing the fuel efficiency of vehicles. President Obama is expected to announce new fuel efficiency standards on Tuesday.

Will the President be able to get enough support from Congress who will need to resist the pressure from big oil contributors? And is it enough, especially since it is well understood by scientists that by 2010 world oil reserves will have reached their peak. With oil supplies on the decline from that point onward how will this policy provide an alternative?

Help us reach our goal of 2,009 twitter followers by June 5th and we’ll make a contribution to have 2,009 trees planted!

We picked June 5th for our goal because that is the day the United Nations hosts events to raise awareness of the environment and to promote policy changes that will help us all to be more earth friendly. It’s called World Environmental Day and this year it is being held in Mexico.

So since StrivinToBeGreen is a new-ish project, to help honor this event and to get the word out about us, I would like you to follow strivintobegreen on twitter @strivin2begreen. Our goal is to gain two-thousand and nine (2,009) followers by June 5th. If we reach that goal, we will make a donation to TreesForTheFuture so that 2,009 trees can be planted.

I realize that it is not a huge number of trees. And it isn’t the million followers Aston Kutcher recently acquired. But it is a simple start on a path I hope we take as we strive to be green. So please follow @strivin2begreen on twitter and watch us grow as those trees we contribute to grow along with us.