White House Unveils Plans to Reduce Pollution
The cutbacks would phase in over the next decade. An official describes it as "an aggressive target covering 35 federal agencies." The plan will cover energy use in all federal buildings and will also affect the use of an estimated 600,000 government vehicles.
The federal government is the largest energy consumer in the U.S. economy and spent more than $24.5 billion on electricity and fuel in 2008 alone. Achieving its pollution reduction target will reduce energy costs by $8 to $11 billion through 2020, according to the White House.
"As the largest energy consumer in the United States, we have a responsibility to American citizens to reduce our energy use and become more efficient," said President Obama in a statement.
The new initiative is a follow up to President Obama's October executive order that set targets for reducing pollution blamed for global warming. The White House Council on Environmental Quality is in charge of the plan.
Reducing and reporting greenhouse gas pollution, according to a statement from the White House, "will ensure that the federal government leads by example in building the clean energy economy." Furthermore, according to the White House, actions taken under the executive order "will spur clean energy investments that create new private-sector jobs, drive long-term savings, build local market capacity, and foster innovation and entrepreneurship in clean energy industries."
Agency efforts to reduce pollution can be tracked at http://www.whitehouse.gov/ceq.
