Commentary: Green Irene believes that small businesses will be the engine of the green economy. Most jobs created over the next few decades to make a transition to clean energy will be in small businesses. These businesses will help homes and businesses reduce energy use, install solar electric and heating systems, and provide eco-consulting services. Green Irene is a great example of that, with over 400 Eco-Consultants and counting across the United States. To learn more about how to become an Eco-Consultant, visit BeAGreenIrene. Green Irene Eco-Consultants are ready to help businesses Go GREEN.
As the United States debates how it should tackle climate change, “Big Business” has generally received the most political attention. Small companies are mostly disengaged from the climate debate, business advocates say, yet environmentally conscious, small enterprises could become influential supporters of climate legislation.
“Small business has to be a strong constituency if this legislation is going to be passed,” said Scott Hauge, president of Small Business California. “If we are going to create the innovation, we are going to create the jobs, we are going to reduce energy use, there needs to be a concerted focus on small business.”
World leaders will craft an international treaty to avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate change this December in Copenhagen, Denmark. Whether the United States can agree on climate change policy in the coming six months will heavily influence the outcome of the Copenhagen negotiations.
The Pew Charitable Trusts revealed last week that the U.S. clean energy economy – more than 68,000 companies that supply clean energy, energy efficiency, conservation strategies, and pollution mitigation technologies – created 770,385 jobs in 2007.
Many of these “green jobs” are small businesses, defined as an employer of 500 workers or less, according to The Center for Small Business and the Environment. In a report also released last week, the Center’s Executive Director Byron Kennard said that the 27 million small businesses in the United States, which produce 51 percent of private sector output, are turning to environmentally beneficial services in greater numbers.
“These are not tree hugger prophesies. These are real businesses, taking real risks, creating real jobs,” Kennard said. “Economically, politically, and socially as well, these green businesses are having a real impact.”
The U.S. House of Representatives is debating the American Clean Energy and Security Act, a bill that promises to reduce U.S. carbon emissions 17 percent by 2020 and 83 percent by 2050, compared to 2005 levels, through a national cap-and-trade system. In addition to placing a price on carbon, which would benefit low-carbon businesses, the legislation would increase energy efficiency standards, establish national mandates for renewable energy, and boost clean energy research.
The current version allows industrial polluters – businesses that emit more than 25,000 tons of carbon annually (such as large electric utilities, natural gas distributors, and cement producers) – to receive about 80 percent of the cap-and-trade system’s emission permits for free. The remaining would be auctioned, often to polluters. These funds are intended to assist consumers with higher energy costs, avoid deforestation in tropical countries, research clean-energy technologies, help developing countries adapt to climate change, and deploy clean energy-technologies worldwide.
The bill would also form a worker assistance and job training program, which supports reducing businesses’ dependency on fossil fuels. The program would be funded with roughly 0.5 percent of the permit auction funds. Commercial buildings would also be entitled to some of the legislation’s financial support for weatherization programs.
Scott Sklar, steering committee chair of the Sustainable Energy Coalition, a group of national and state-level business, environmental, consumer, and energy policy organizations that promotes increased federal support for energy efficiency and renewable energy, said the legislation’s benefits for small businesses are too small to provide meaningful support. He criticized the bill for prioritizing large industry instead.
“I don’t think any iterations of the [climate] bills I’ve seen so far support small businesses,” said Sklar, president of The Stella Group, a renewable energy marketing firm. “The allowances are given to big business polluters for the most part.”
California industries used similar arguments in an unsuccessful effort to derail the state’s cap-and-trade bill. Upon realizing that small business owners were likely to support the legislation if businesses could improve their energy efficiency, legislators responded with a small business toolkit. The program guides businesses on how to reduce their energy costs (and therefore greenhouse gas emissions) through voluntary efficiency gains.
“By small business stepping up to give the voice to our position, we were heard,” said Hauge, who helped pass the bill in 2006. “Big business was not aligned.”
Credit to the Worldwatch Institute.
