News | Energy Efficiency

http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/03/the-white-house-convenes-young-green-leaders/

WASHINGTON — As the Senate wades back into the climate debate, the White House is enlisting some of the young voters who helped usher President Obama into office to galvanize support for the climate and energy bill.

On Wednesday, the administration summoned an eclectic group of 20-somethings for a forum focused on laying the groundwork for a green economy. The participants, including West Coast college upperclassmen and East Coast urban entrepreneurs, spoke with Cabinet officials who were all well over 40 about how they could work with the administration.
“The world will be passing us by if we don’t take this opportunity” to lead a clean energy revolution, Steven Chu, the energy secretary, told the group gathered in an auditorium inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. “I’m an old guy, but your future, your kids’ future, is at stake.”
Mr. Chu spoke on a panel with Ken Salazar, the interior secretary, who pressed participants to “educate yourselves and spread the gospel,” and Nancy Sutland, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Hilda Solis, the labor secretary, and Lisa Jackson, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, followed on a second panel.
In the crowd, Jenn Engstrom listened intently. A 22-year-old senior at the University of California, Berkeley, she serves on the executive board of CalPIRG, a student-run public interest group.
“I’m really happy with what the administration has done when it comes to clean energy and global warming, and I really want Congress to follow,” she said. “So I’m getting what they think are the next steps to make sure we do get a climate bill out of Congress.”
Hands flew high in the question-and-answer sessions, although the panelists were only able to answer a few in each round. The participants voiced a wide range of concerns, from the impact of hydroelectric dams on American Indian populations to the E.P.A.’s review of mountaintop removal coal mining permits to the longevity of a green jobs recovery.
Lauren Von Der Pool, 25, whose nonprofit Von Der Pool Gourmet trains inner-city kids in sustainable agriculture and green jobs, asked about the administration’s efforts to help low-income communities go green. Ms. Von Der Pool, of Washington, said the talks, which were streamed live online, were a step in the right direction but that much remained to be done.
“We need some hard-core concrete action,” she said. “This is just another one of those steps we have to take to get to that next level.”