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2009-01-27 06:38:22
By James Coomarasamy
BBC News, Washington
President Obama has asked the Environmental Protection Agency to look into
allowing California to increase fuel efficiency standards for cars.
Is this request part of a patchwork of measures that will create a cleaner
environment and green jobs?
Or - as its critics contend - will it help to create a patchwork of fuel
standards that will end up costing even more jobs in America's struggling car
industry?
The battle lines were drawn some time ago and they remain as clear as ever, but
today the battle cries have been much louder on one side of the debate.
For environmentalists, the president's action is an unequivocal cause for
celebration - a sign he means to walk the walk on the green agenda and overturn
years of indifference.
Tough love
There has certainly been rejoicing from California's green (Republican)
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and its Democratic senators, notably Barbara
Boxer.
She has tended to live up to her name, when environmental officials from the
Bush Administration have testified at her Senate Environment and Public Works
Committee.
In the other corner, there have been cautious words from the car manufacturers.
General Motors, which has announced another 2,000 job losses at plants in
Michigan and Ohio, released a statement pledging support for policies which
support "meaningful and workable" solutions and targets.
The statement went on to say: "We look forward to contributing to a
comprehensive policy discussion that takes into account the development pace of
new technologies, alternative fuels, and market and economic factors."
A few caveats there, although a less combative than usual reaction from an
industry whose request for a multi-billion dollar federal loan has reduced its
political leverage.
Ohio Republican Senator George Voinovich was rather more direct: "The federal
government should not be piling on an industry already hurting in a time like
this."
But is it a case of "piling on", or - as the Obama administration would have it
- of offering the industry some much-needed tough love?
By forcing the pace (or helping California to force the pace) of fuel
efficiency standards, are the federal authorities jump-starting the car
industry's efforts to regain its place as a global innovator and prolonging its
survival?
Whatever the case, Barack Obama is spending some of his political capital here,
on an issue which he emphasised on the campaign trail and - at several points -
in his inaugural address.
Economic impact
As the US economy has grown worse, opinion polls suggest that green issues have
slipped down the public's list of concerns.
A survey for Pew Research Centre found that, while 56% of Americans saw the
environment as a top priority a year ago, 41% hold that view today.
The percentage of those who see job security as a top priority has, by
contrast, gone from 61% to 82% in the same poll.
And those findings suggest that, in the short term at least, this initiative
will be judged as much on its economic as on its environmental impact.
Will the retro-fitting of cars, to meet the new fuel standards, really create
the number of new, green jobs that the administration hopes it will?