Environment, Energy & Transportation

Our Values

Health of the physical environment directly impacts the short-term and long-term health of our citizens, communities and economy, and must be protected.

Fossil fuels are a finite and dwindling resource and we must swiftly transform our economy and technology to be based on renewable energy sources.

All countries and governments must respond swiftly and strongly to reduce carbon dioxide emissions to slow the rise in the global temperature and reduce the long-term effects of climate change, ocean acidification, and rising oceans levels.

Regulations must be used to ensure that the cost of environmental degradation be paid for by those who create the pollution or benefit from the action that caused the pollution.

2010 Policy Priorities

• Continued ban on oil drilling and exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
• Protect, strengthen and expand the renewable energy requirements of Initiative 937 passed in 2006 (15% of their electricity from new renewable resources by 2020 and to undertake all cost-effective energy conservation)
• Enact local laws, regulations, and zoning that enable local public and private initiatives to develop renewable energy sources
• Enact H.R.2454 - American Clean Energy And Security Act of 2009 (awaiting Senate action)
• Clean up and elimination of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation site as a repository of additional nuclear waste
• Clean up Puget Sound and waters emptying into it, and enact new laws or regulations as needed to eliminate pollution at the source
• Enact the Clean Water Protection Act (H.R. 1310), which would protect Appalachia’s streams by restoring the prohibition on using waste to fill streams and wetlands, a current practice of "mountaintop removal" coal mining