WH blog: 10 Facts about wind power

Photo courtesy of Nordex USA

Our countdown of the top ten things you didn't know about wind energy:

10. Human civilizations have harnessed wind power for thousands of years. Early forms of windmills used wind to crush grain or pump water. Now, modern wind turbines use the wind to create electricity. Learn how here.

9. A wind turbine has as many as 8,000 different components.

8. Wind turbines are big. A wind turbine blade can be up to 150 feet long, and a turbine tower can be over 250 feet tall, almost as tall as the Statue of Liberty.

7. Higher wind speeds mean more electricity, and wind turbines are getting taller to reach higher altitudes where it’s even windier. See the Energy Department’s wind resource mapsto find average wind speeds in your state or hometown.

6. Most of the components of wind turbines installed in the United States are manufactured here. Facilities for building wind turbine parts are located in over 40 states, and the U.S. wind energy industry currently employs 75,000 people. 

5. The technical resource potential of the winds above U.S. coastal waters is enough to provide over 4,000 gigawatts of electricity, or approximately four times the generating capacity of the current U.S. electric power system. Although not all of these resources will be developed, this represents a major opportunity to provide power to highly-populated coastal cities. See what the Energy Department is doing to develop offshore wind in the United States.

4. The United States generates more wind energy than any other country except China, and wind accounts for 35 percent of all newly installed U.S. electricity generation capacity over the last four years.

3. The United States’ wind power capacity reached 47,000 megawatts by the end of 2011 and has since grown to 50,000 megawatts. That’s enough electricity to power over 12 million homes annually -- as many homes as in the entire state of California -- and represents an 18-fold increase in capacity since 2000.

2. Wind energy is affordable. Wind prices for power contracts signed in 2011 are 50 percent lower than those signed in 2009, and levelized wind prices (the price the utility pays to buy power from a wind farm) are as low as 3 cents per kilowatt-hour in some areas of the country.

1. As much as 20 percent of our nation’s electricity could come from wind energy by 2030 but continued support for clean energy tax credits is critical to achieving this target. That’s why President Obama is calling for an extension on the Production Tax Credit -- to support wind producers in the U.S. and continue to help drive the wind industry’s growth.

 Liz Hartman is the Communications Team Lead of Wind and Water Power at the U.S. Energy Department

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WH Blog: USDA Unveils MyPlate

Posted by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack on June 2, 2011 at 12:04 PM EDT

Today was an exciting day at USDA as I was joined by First Lady Michelle Obama and Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin to unveil USDA's new food icon, MyPlate. The icon is a departure from MyPyramid and serves as a quick, simple reminder to all consumers, built off of the 2010 Dietary Guidelines for all Americans.

We all know that what we eat matters - MyPlate offers a visual reminder to make healthy food choices when you choose your next meal. MyPlate can help prioritize food choices by reminding us to make half of our plate fruits and vegetables and shows us the other important food groups for a well-balanced meal: whole grains, lean proteins, and low fat dairy.

The Republicans have been trying to make an issue about MyPlate saying it is too expensive to implement. Huh!


The MyPlate pie chart makes it clear that Americans need more grains and vegetables in their diet. 

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WH Blog: Weekly Address: Clean Energy to Out-Innovate the Rest of the World

You Tube comment:

We in Germany have a big agitation by enlarging renewable energies actually and I think its completely the right way that the USA want to enlarge this sector of producing energy too. 

Because this are the energy sources of the future because wind, water and light aren´t limited. We can be precursor in Europe and I hope that the United States can be the precursor for the rest of the world and other developed countries. 

I think Obama is the right president for the right moment. Greets from Germany

GermanUSAFriends90
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WH Blog has an innovative links to the 2011 State of the Union Address

Interactive Feature: The First Lady’s Box, State of the Union Address 2011

Posted by Kori Schulman on January 24, 2011 at 10:19 PM EST

For nearly three decades, extraordinary Americans who exemplify the themes and ideals laid out in the State of the Union Address have been invited to join the First Lady in her viewing box. From small business owners to young innovators, military heroes to health care reform beneficiaries – use the interactive feature below to learn more about the remarkable individuals who will join First Lady Michelle Obama for the 2011 State of the Union (SOTU)Address.

To see the people who are sitting with the first lady, see the graphic titled the First Lady's Box which displays 21 chairs: See http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/01/24/interactive-feature-first-lady-s-box-state-union-address-2011

Click on any of the chairs to see who is sitting there. Here is a graphic of the First lady's Box at the 2011 State of the Union.

There's more. The WH Blog has provided several means for the public to pose questions to the attendees at the 2011 SOTU Address.

Check out WhiteHouse.gov/sotu for an enhanced viewing experience of President Obama's State of the Union address and for opportunities to engage online with White House officials and even President Obama himself.

Read the full press release here.

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New White House blog video: West Wing Week

Thanks for checking out the West Wing Week, your guide to everything that's happening at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

This week, walk step by step with the President as he speaks about 6 straight months of job growth, celebrates America's Independence Day with Military Families, watches a firework extravaganza with the First Lady, meets with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, tours Smith Electric Vehicles in Kansas City and much more.

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The White House Blog: right wing disinformation continues

Posted by Jim Gilio on February 2, 2010 at 10:09 PM EST

Last week, we told you how CNN had fact-checked the top ten items in a report issued by two opponents of the Recovery Act and found that nine of their top ten claims were false.

• “We took a closer look at the Senators’ top ten examples of so-called waste.  We found that nine of the ten did not tell the whole story and in some cases were inaccurate.” [CNN, 1/25/10]

But recently, CNN and others in the press have taken a look at #11 on the Senators’ list: which they call the “The Napa Wine Train” project, but is really a job creating flood protection project that will make the city of Napa safer while putting up to 600 people on the job.

In their report, the Senators’ titled the project “All Aboard The Wine Train!,“ and imply that the Recovery Act is frivolously funding a three hour Napa Valley train tour:

• “The Napa Wine Train has proven to be a popular tourist attraction, providing, ― a relaxing three hour journey along the thirty six-mile round-trip… through one of the world's most famous wine valleys. One of the most popular meals on the train is the $124 Vista Dome Lunch, where guests enjoy ―a complimentary glass of California sparkling wine [that] continues with a four course lunch of their choice.”

Thankfully, CNN and others have recently corrected this report:

• CNN said: “In fact, the money is not being spent on the wine train. The stimulus money is for a massive flood control project for the valley.” [CNN, 1/28/10]
• A spokesperson for the Napa River Flood Control Project agreed, “This is perfectly fitting into what stimulus was intend to do. As you see here, people are on the job working today who may not be otherwise.” [CNN, 1/28/10]
• And you can check with the Napa Wine Train folks, “The person who did the research for the senators didn't do a thorough job and I think if they had done a thorough job we wouldn't have been on the list at all.” [CNN, 1/28/10]

Even the San Francisco Chronicle posted a blog calling out Senators’ McCain and Coburn:

• “It made for good sound bytes: Obama's handing money to the rich liberals in California! (Lunch on the train runs into three figures.) But it turns out that's not what happened at all.  The stimulus is actually funding the Napa River Flood Project's efforts to elevate the train's tracks and build a flood wall at the depot. These projects are just a small part of an overall plan to manage flooding in the area.” [SF CHRONICLE]

Here’s what’s really going on:

• “Supporters of the project say the stimulus fund will create at least 600 jobs and those jobs are expected to last two to three years until the project is done. But that's for the whole flood project. The contractor expects the track work will employ some 200 people. Once complete it should mean Napa won't flood every few years.” [CNN, 1/28/10]

As the President puts forward new measures to ensure every American who wants a job can get one, here’s what we know: 2 million jobs already funded by the Recovery Act, two quarters of GDP growth helping pave the road to recovery, and a flood protection project in Napa Valley is creating jobs while protecting a community against flooding.

Here’s what we expect moving forward: as the President introduces new jobs measures like he did today, we hope that the Administration’s opponents get off the sidelines and engage in meaningful dialogue that will help rebuild America’s middle class.

Jim Gilio is White House Spokesperson for the Recovery Act

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The White House Blog: Decking the Halls of the White House

Nearly every day this month, streams of visitors pass through the White House doors to get a firsthand glimpse of the holiday decorations dressing the Executive Residence. By the end of the holiday season, nearly 100,000 guests will have visited the White house to see the 27 trees, 61 wreaths, and about 2,700 yards of ribbon canvassing the house.

Other tidbits:

o 92 volunteers from 24 states assisted in the decorating for over 3,400 volunteer hours.

o There are 6 live trees with their roots balled and wrapped in burlap at the East Wing, West Wing and North Portico Entrances. These trees will be adopted by the National Parks Service after Christmas is over and hopefully replanted in a new home.

o The official White House Christmas in the Blue Room is a Douglas Fir that stands 18 ½ feet high and is nearly 13 feet wide. The tree is lit with environmentally sound LED lights.

o 500 stems of dried hydrangea were used, many of which were used in fresh arrangements first and then dried later for use in the holiday decorations.

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The White House Blog: Income Inequality Is At An All-Time High

Posted by Jared Bernstein

"...while the bottom 99 percent of incomes grew at a solid pace of 2.7 percent per year from 1993-2000, these incomes grew only 1.3 percent per year from 2002-2007. As a result, in the economic expansion of 2002-2007, the top 1 percent captured two thirds of income growth."

Even before we got to the White House, the President, the Vice President, and the economic team were crafting policies designed to offset the deepest recession since the Great Depression.   Back in mid-December of last year, I remember a meeting in Chicago, with the snow swirling outside, as we began to plan the Recovery Act, the financial stabilization plan, and housing relief, all in the context of a budget that would bring down the trillion-plus dollar deficit we were about to inherit as quickly as possible.

I also remember the Vice President talking about the difficulties facing the middle class, struggles that predated the recession.   With the campaign fresh in their minds, he and the President recalled that even in supposedly good times, when the economy was expanding and unemployment was low, the families they met on the trail were having far too much trouble making ends meet.

Saving for college, paying for health care, keeping up with the mortgage payments … just making their basic budgets balance out at the end of the month seemed awfully hard in an economy that was supposedly solid.

Of course, that solid economy was fading fast; the recession was a year old, unemployment was rising, and helping people get back to work had become our top priority. But the longer-term, structural challenges that have been facing the middle class since long before the recession began were never far from the President’s mind, which is why he asked the VP to chair the Middle Class Task Force.

Today, in August of 2009, we’re faced with yet another set of realities. After falling at a rate of about 6% from the last quarter of 2008 through the first quarter of this year, a rate of decline we hadn’t seen in half a century, the
economy contracted at a 1% rate in the second quarter of 2009. Yes, our economy is still ailing, but six months ago, economists worried the recession would descend into depression; now they’re asking when recession will become recovery. 

Here in the White House, however, recovery means something very specific, and it’s different than what economists generally mean when they talk about it. According to the panel that decides when recessions officially begin and end, you don’t need job growth or falling unemployment to declare that a recovery is

underway. In fact, in the last two recoveries, it took 15 and 19 months, respectively, before the unemployment rate peaked.

That definition doesn’t work for us. No jobs, no recovery.

But—and this is the real subject of this post—job growth isn’t enough either. Remember, unemployment fell to below 5% at the end of the last expansion, but middle-income families ended up worse off, in real dollar terms, than they were before that expansion began.

The productivity of our economy increased by 19% from 2000 to 2007, but the real median income of working-age households fell $2,000. The share of Americans living in poverty was actually higher in 2007 than it was in 2000.

How could this happen? In fact, the arithmetic is disarmingly simple. If the economy’s growing, but middle-class and low-income families are falling behind, then the growth must be accruing to the top of the scale. And that’s exactly

what happened.

Some of the best data on income inequality are collected by two economists: Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty. Their data go back almost to the beginning of the last century, allowing us to make some pretty amazing observations, like the one shown in the figure below.

Income concentration, measured as the share of income going to the top 1% of households, was higher in 2007 (23.5%) than in any year on record going back to 1913, with one ominous exception: 1928, the height of the speculative, bubbly "roaring 20s" and the year before the stock market crashed and the Great Depression began.

For middle-class families to be part of the next recovery, this trend must reverse. 

Yes, we want to see a GDP recovery take hold as soon as possible, and once we start seeing robust, consistent job growth we’ll know we’re solidly on track. But even then, we won’t be done: not until the prosperity we’re generating reaches
everyone who’s contributing to it, not until all the bakers get their fair slice of the pie—not just the owners of the bakery or the investors in the bakery, but the men and women who are actually doing the work.

Here’s what the President said about this way back in February 2007, when he announced his candidacy:

"… let's be the generation that ensures our nation's workers are sharing in our prosperity. Let's protect the hard-earned benefits their companies have promised. Let's make it possible for hardworking Americans to save for retirement. And let's allow our unions and their organizers to lift up this country's middle class again.

"Let's be the generation that ends poverty in America. Every single person willing to work should be able to get job training that leads to a job, and earn a living wage that can pay the bills, and afford child care so their kids have a safe place to go when they work. Let's do this."

Though he may not have realized at the time, the President-to-be was really describing the work of the Middle Class Task Force. Vice President Biden, the Task Force staff, and our members at all the cabinet agencies will do everything we can to make sure that the next recovery lines up very differently than the ones in the graph above. The middle class won’t get left behind again.

Jared Bernstein is Chief Economist to Vice President Biden, and Executive Director of the Middle Class Task Force 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/14/income-inequality-is-at-a_n_259516.html

http://www.emailthecongress.com/news/2005/04-05-bumper-sticker-gets-colorado-residents-barred-from-bush-event.html

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The Road to Recovery

by Peter R. Orszag, Director

Today on Capitol Hill, OMB Deputy Director Rob Nabors testified in front of the House Government Oversight and Reform Committee about the Recovery Act.

A major focus at the hearing was a report issued today by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the non-partisan, independent government watchdog. GAO found that Recovery Act spending was ahead of schedule and was helping to mitigate the economic downturn.   

In its report, the GAO found: 

• In New York City, officials estimate that the Recovery Act funds saved 14,000 teachers’ jobs because the school district was able to use the dollars to avoid massive cutbacks in education programs.

• Michigan will use part of its Recovery funding to weatherize 32,000 homes, reducing energy usage in each home by an average of 25 percent, and employing an estimated 1,500 people.

• In California, state officials had been looking at increasing college tuition by 26 percent. The GAO reports, however, that, because of Recovery funds, any tuition hike will stay in the single digits.

These reports are good news, but it will take time for us to work our way out of the problems we face.

Let’s be clear: we haven’t swapped our propeller hats for rose-colored glasses. Although the pace of job losses has slowed significantly since the Administration took office — we shouldn’t forget that the economy was shedding an average of 691,000 jobs in January, February, and March — the June unemployment numbers are a stark reminder of how deep the economic downturn we face is and how much more work we have ahead of us.

Our current economic challenges were years in the making, and they will not be solved overnight. Nonetheless, we will be taking a close look at some of some of GAO’s constructive suggestions to improve Recovery Act implementation and effectiveness. And we’ll also continue our work to improve education, move toward a clean energy future, and reform health care, so that we have a new foundation for broad-based, sustainable economic growth.

source: White House blog

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