[Cross-posted with Huffingtonpost.com]

In 2005 General Electric launched their “EcoMagination” campaign, a marketing effort built around selling products that help solve environmental problems and create green jobs.

According to GE’s CEO Jeffery Immelt “Our Ecomagination initiative has created tens of thousands of jobs at GE and in our supply chain.” And if the U.S. steps up and takes the lead on climate mitigation, Immelt promises to “create 250,000 green jobs in the economy.”

So what are GE’s new green jobs of the future going to look like? According to one group of GE “green” workers who have filed a racial discrimination lawsuit in Alabama (complaint below), GE’s vision for a green future looks more like a nightmare. (more…)

[LNS has been hearing from members that some in the environmental movement have been struggling with how to talk with labor allies about climate change.  So we decided to put together some talking points to help enviros jump start these vital conversations.  Next up is a companion piece for labor movement folks on "Talking to Environmentalist About Climate Change."]

* Like it or not, climate change is coming: Focus on the inevitability of climate change and impact on the working lives of current union members. For example: Sir Nicolas Stern, former Chief Economist of the World Bank, predicts that global warming will have an economic impact greater than the Great Depression and World Wars I and II combined. (more…)

By Joe Uehlein, Labor Network for Sustainability

[PDF version of this report is available here]

Thousands of “green jobs” have been created by President Obama’s stimulus package; millions more will be created by proposed climate legislation; tens of millions will be required to create the low-carbon economy that scientists say is necessary for the survival of the earth as we know it.  Further, nearly all existing jobs will have to be made “greener” as existing workplaces convert to more climate-friendly production.  Both new and existing jobs that contribute to reducing the emission of carbon and other greenhouse gasses (GHGs) have come to be known as “green jobs.”

Environmentalists and the public should ensure that the new green jobs provide the right to have a union, and then encourage the workers to organize and employers to recognize and cooperate with them.  Here’s why. (more…)

by Tim Costello and the Labor Network for Sustainability

[PDF version of this report is available here]

["Labor and Climate Change" is a briefing paper that provides activists inside and outside the labor movement a way to understand the interests and concerns of different segments of organized labor in climate change issues.  It was the last major work by Tim Costello, who died in December, 2009.]

This briefing paper provides a strategy for addressing organized labor’s stake in climate change. Its goal is to provide activists inside and outside the labor movement with the information they need to help shape effective, worker friendly climate protection policies and garner support for them from organized labor. (more…)