Stimulus Deal Reached. How Did We Do?
February 11, 2009 | Posted by Sam Parry in climate action report
Senate and House negotiators reached agreement on a final $789 billion stimulus package Wednesday afternoon.
Hours before the deal was announced, we sent an urgent alert outlining seven elements for a green bill. Our legislative analysts are reviewing the final language of the bill to see how we did. We will update this post as details emerge.
In the meantime, one thing is clear: The EDF Action Network stepped up in a big way. Since early January, you sent more than 120,000 emails urging the House and Senate to pass a green stimulus.
We couldn’t be more thankful and proud to have such incredible grassroots support. The EDF Action Network rocks!
Thanks for all you do.
– UPDATED 2/12/09, 10:31am –
What we know so far – we’ll know more once we get the full text:
- By far the largest funding ever for clean energy and energy efficiency.
- The Manufacturing Extension Partnership will get funding (as we requested)
- High-speed rail will get $8 billion dollars (even more than we requested)
- Very large investment in transit ($8.4 billion) as we requested
- Includes funds for new construction of commuter and light rail, modernizing existing transit systems, and purchasing buses and equipment to needed to increase public transportation and improve intermodal and transit facilities.
- States have 787 ready-to-go transit projects totaling about $16 billion.
22 Responses
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February 11th, 2009 at 10:29 pm
[...] the House and Senate reaching agreement on a final stimulus bill, our focus shifts to passing global warming [...]
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February 11th, 2009 at 11:08 pm
[...] the House and Senate reaching agreement on a final stimulus bill, our focus shifts to passing global warming [...]
Comment from Kathy Blume
February 12th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Right On!
Comment from Nan
February 12th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
This is great news. What I can say is that we have had a project that is shovel-ready for an eco-community that will have all LEED certified homes. However, becauase these wonderful banks received their bailouts and are now keeping it to themselves, we cannot complete the project. Hopefully there will be some form of stimulus assistance for those builders and developers like us that are looking for investors to complete the funding. There are plenty of people out there that want this, but the banks are too greedy to help others besides themselves.
Comment from Southern Beale
February 12th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
I heard but cannot verify that the bill supports coal and nuclear power more than wind or msolar, and also includes a billion dollars for nuclear weapons research. I’d like to know if this is true and what the details are on that.
Comment from Jim Steitz
February 12th, 2009 at 3:31 pm
It is unfortunate that the environmental community, and the left in general, is going along with this stimulus program simply because it contains money for good things. It gives many times more for typical sprawl-inducing roads and support for the coal industry. Long-term policy advocacy always fails when it allows itself to be bought off by short-term goodies, making true structural change less likely.
Comment from Anton-Scott Goustin
February 12th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Southern Beale: I just received the good news from Council for a Livable World, “We’re thrilled to announce that in the final economic stimulus bill that was just released by a Congressional committee, funding for the nuclear weapons infrastructure was removed!”
John Isaacs and Guy Stevens http://livableworld.org/
Comment from Sue Kemp-Conge
February 12th, 2009 at 6:20 pm
Before you get all excited about WIND ENERGY, please investigate these companies that are going into areas that are residential and in the Finger Lakes Region where wind is not a commodity. They are taking our tax dollars in the guise of “Green.” SCAM where I live.
Somebody, please investigate the Finger Lakes Region.
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February 12th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
[...] Environmental Defense Fund: Stimulus Deal Reached. How Did We Do? “Senate and House negotiators reached agreement on a final $789 billion stimulus package Wednesday afternoon. [...] Since early January, the EDF Action Network sent more than 120,000 emails supporting a green bill. So, how did we do? Our legislative experts are reviewing the final language and will be updating details here.” [...]
Comment from Janine
February 12th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
i think that this bill sounds great, minus the unfortunate coal situation.
i hope that if they’re giving money to the coal industry, it’s at least to make cleaner coal.
cleaner coal is still coal, but at least its a bit better.
Comment from Stephen Knutson
February 12th, 2009 at 7:20 pm
Until we have electric cars that can charge from our solar roof panels and a 3,000 mile high speed solar/wind powered coast to coast monorail that has the track covered with solar panels and can supply energy to cities along it’s route we will not have anything worth bragging about. Baby steps must be replaced with giant leaps.
Comment from Chuck W Pitman
February 12th, 2009 at 10:34 pm
Mr. Knutson, we do have electric cars that can charge from our solar roof panels, they have been around since the 1990’s; they were made by Toyota and GM, just to name a couple. Watch “Who Killed the Electric Car,” you can get it from Netflix.
Chuck
Comment from Chuck W Pitman
February 12th, 2009 at 10:37 pm
When and where can we view the whole stimulus package?
Comment from H.Marie Ostrander
February 12th, 2009 at 10:44 pm
I would not support this stimulus as long as it supports the coal industry. By the way, coal is NOT clean in any way.
Comment from emma
February 13th, 2009 at 2:29 am
the finger lakes region is gaining funds from the state to relieve rail workers when commission is down, which would be now. This means that the US dept of labor is spending hundreds of millions of dollars for people not to work in (so far I found) Rochester, Albany and Erie, PA when they could be using it to develop a rail system. Hopefully transit systems like these will produce a growing economic market for trade through travel. New York and Pennsylvania are two of 17 states receiving money from this fund through the dept of labor Shared Work Program.
Comment from John
February 13th, 2009 at 12:29 pm
3% of the Transportation funds set aside for Transportation Enhancements money that is often used for bicycle and pedestrian transportation projects (bike lanes, trails, sidewalks etc.).
Comment from Lyra
February 13th, 2009 at 2:10 pm
This is a major step towards enacting many environmental laws to protect our future. Let us not waver from the ongoing mission to create a sustaiable future for all living beings on this fragile planet.
I have seen “Who Killed The Electric Car”, “An Inconvenient Truth”, and “A Crude Awakening” and these movies have spurred me to create a law addressing energy. It is called “The Zero Emissions Energy Mandate” which I have publilshed at the Care2 Petition site. I would also like to invite all of you to a group where we are discussing policy and laws which need to be created and enacted to ensure that government and businesses do not back out on their commitments to create cleaner energy and more earth friendly products. The group is located at http://www.care2.com/c2c/group/earthcollege./
Peace,
Lyra Jubb
Comment from catherine
February 13th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
GOOD JOB everyone, BUT -Thank god our Congressional Representatives multiply each one of our individual e-mails as indicative of how four (?) times as many people feel.
We can do better than 120,000 messages as we defend our environment and help sway policy decisions. This is the first time in my long life that we so clearly have an influence and a pulpit and we have to keep leaning into the job.
Please remember to send petitions to your friends ! We need every voice we can get. THIS is our moment in energy history. We cannot fail now.
Comment from Lawrence Carroll
February 14th, 2009 at 5:21 pm
“I heard but cannot verify that the bill supports coal and nuclear power more than . . . wind and solar . . .I’d like to know if this is true and what the details are on that.”
Here is the answer to your worry I think:
“Pro-nuclear loan program dropped from stimulus
By H. JOSEF HEBERT – 1 day ago
WASHINGTON (AP) — A proposal to increase a loan guarantee program for innovative energy projects by $50 billion has been stripped from the economic recovery package after environmentalists argued it would primarily benefit the nuclear industry.”
url:http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ixsxpZbgEfS0reso1kOHO-GYSsuAD96AA3VG0
Comment from Paul Byrley
February 14th, 2009 at 11:38 pm
I really admire all of you who are so active in this cruical time for our planet. I am a not very active supporter and not nearly as informed as you all are. Because I need to learn from you, I would like to request that you re-read your posts before you submit to be sure they are clear. About a third of the posts I read were obviously missing words or using the wrong word so I was unable to even guess at the meaning. Clear communication is vital to the winning of this war. Again, thank you all so much.
Paul
Comment from Jim Buchanan
February 15th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
Are we going to finally get the wind power we desperately need in New England? That will be jobs and cheaper energy helping all businesses and families. Not to mention less dependence on foreign oil! I for one do not want to go back to the desert to fight Exxon-Mobil’s War! I think ‘ol Ted has slowed up the project long enough for his rich cronie neighbors on Nantucket! Along with the wind power here let’s take out some of the hot air from Washington in the next election too. Even the Rep Governor from RI believes that wind power is the way to go. Bring it On!
Comment from Heather Shelby
February 18th, 2009 at 3:57 pm
Chuck W. Pitman,
The actual stimulus bill is hundreds of pages, but the Senate Committee on Appropriations has released a summary, which you can find here as a PDF: http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/SenateStimSummary.pdf
Heather Shelby
Online Membership Associate
Environmental Defense Fund