The White House announced new executive actions and private-sector agreements Thursday to advance solar energy and energy-efficiency measures that it says will save businesses and homes $10 billion through 2030.
The move comes ahead of Tuesday’s United Nations climate summit in New York. The United States will be looking to make new commitments toward tackling climate change, which most climate scientists say is largely driven by humans burning greenhouse gas-emitting fossil fuels.
The White House said the new measures would eliminate 300 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions, or the equivalent of the one year’s worth of carbon emissions from 60 million cars.
The Obama administration will put $68 million of loans and grants toward 540 renewable energy and energy-efficiency projects in rural communities, 240 of which would be solar. It also is partnering with three military bases to promote solar energy jobs training for veterans, an extension of an earlier effort to boost such training at community colleges.
The White House finalized new commercial building codes that it said would save more energy than previous standards, proposed a more stringent energy conservation mark for air conditioning units, and paved the way for the Department of Housing and Urban Development to use loan guarantees on renewable energy and energy-efficiency projects.
Several cities and companies also committed to expanding their solar generation. Those include the District of Columbia’s Housing Authority and Cisco Systems, which agreed to increase its global on-site solar capacity to 2.7 megawatts by 2015 to help the company get a quarter of its power from renewable sources.
Another 28 states, cities and businesses also signed up for the administration’s “Better Building Challenge,” which aims to improve energy efficiency in multi-unit buildings. Those include the state of New York and the Houston Housing Authority, among others.
