“For far too long environmentalism has gotten pitted against economic development,” New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Tuesday in Gaston Hall. “Going green is the best and indeed only pro-growth strategy.”
Bloomberg delivered the keynote address of the Second Annual Newsweek Global Environment Leadership Conference, which drew roughly 350 environmental leaders from all over the country to Georgetown.
Bloomberg discussed the country’s need to protect both the environment and the economy through “simple, real changes in our private lives,” and through governmental programs such as his year-old PlaNYC, which was unveiled this time last year on Earth Day.
PlaNYC has 127 initiatives on its agenda and strives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent by 2030, expand the subway system, require that all cabs be hybrid models by 2012, make 900,000 buildings more efficient through the use of clean, renewable power, plant roughly one million new trees, double the use of solar power in New York City and integrate the solar initiative into the curriculum of several local high schools. New York City currently produces more emissions than the entire country of Portugal.
Bloomberg expressed disappointment that the main option for funding PlaNYC’s projects—to begin congestion pricing that would charge commuters a fee for entering the city during busy times—was not brought to a vote by a New York caucus Monday, “effectively killing it.”
Nevertheless hopeful, he encouraged other cities to adopt similar plans and offered suggestions to remedy four major environmental problems: increasing environmental research and development, ending the subsidization of ethanol-based corn oil, producing more energy efficient vehicles and penalizing carbon emissions.
Bloomberg also highlighted the need for courageous leadership and for the United States to entice other countries to act abroad by setting a positive example at home. He recalled how the introduction of the smoking ban in New York City was initially discouraged by other governmental leaders but eventually came to be extremely popular among citizens and was adopted not only throughout the United States but also worldwide.
“People said ‘no one will go to bars anymore, they will all go to the library,’” Bloomberg joked, “but more people came into New York City … no one’s going to the library, at least any more than they did before.”
