Daily Score Blog

Folks in Oregon have been trumpeting the good news all day today -- and rightly so; according to the Pew Charitable Trusts Oregon has the largest percentage of its jobs involved in the clean energy economy. (Click map for larger version)

True -- it's a small chunk (1.02 percent of the 1.9 million jobs in the state), but it shows that the state has claimed a lead in the transition to the new energy economy.

Idaho also ranked well, in the second tier with .63 percent of its jobs being green. Washington didn't fare quite as well -- only .55 percent of its 3.1 million jobs.

As we've noted before, it's hard to define exactly what green-collar jobs are. Pew puts them in the context of the clean energy economy, which it defines as:

A clean energy economy generates jobs, businesses and investments while expanding clean energy production, increasing energy efficiency, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, waste and pollution, and conserving water and other natural resources.

The clean energy economy cuts across five categories: (1) Clean Energy; (2) Energy
Efficiency; (3) Environmentally Friendly Production; (4) Conservation and Pollution Mitigation; and (5) Training and Support.

See the NYT blog piece on it, and the report itself (pdf).

The Waxman-Markey climate and energy legislation (a.k.a. the American Clean Energy and Security Act, ACES, H.R. 2454) before Congress right now has captured a lot of attention for its cap and trade provisions. But as we noted earlier there is a lot going in the legislation in terms of interesting complimentary policies to reduce emissions through increases energy efficiency – including retrofitting and weatherizing existing homes and buildings.

There is a portion of Waxman-Markey that used to be a separate bill, proposed by Vermont Congressman Peter Welch, that would give states money—$2.5 billion per year until 2013—to spend on incentivizing retrofits to commercial and residential buildings. There are some elements in this part of the larger legislation that stand out.

As Waxman-Markey, the sweeping legislation that tackles America's greenhouse gas emissions, is making its way through Congress, one of the biggest sticking points and an issue we're wrestling with ourselves here at Sightline Institute is its proposed use of large amounts of "offsets" to meet emissions goals.

In short, the bill says that polluters can pay for both pollution permits and offsets to help them meet the cap that limits how much greenhouse gas they can release. A cement company in Seattle, let's say, that is going to produce 100 tons of carbon dioxide could pay for 90 tons of permits and 10 tons of offsets, perhaps from a dairy farmer in the Midwest who's going to install a system for capturing methane from cow manure.

Sounds like a good idea. The cement company cuts its pollution, and helps the farmer -- who otherwise doesn't come under the bill's emissions cap -- cut his pollution, too. Yeah! Emissions go down all over the place.

But it's so not that simple. Whether you love, hate, or merely tolerate offsets can lead you to wildly divergent conclusions as to whether their use means the planet will sizzle or only warm by a couple of degrees (which still is not nice). Here's how it breaks down: