Earthjustice expects - by Trip Van Noppen

Trip Van Noppen is the president of Earthjustice, founded as the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund in 1971. See his biography.

We congratulate president-elect Obama and applaud the choice of the American people to move in a different direction on the environment than that of the last eight years. We may be eight years behind, but better late than never to address the pressing problems of global warming, reliance on fossil fuels and threats to our air, water, natural places and native wildlife. We're heartened that we now have a chance to see some real stewardship of America's natural gifts once again from the highest office in the land.

We expect the new Obama administration to regulate the global warming gas, CO2, as called for by the US Supreme Court. Burning coal for power creates roughly half of all the global warming air pollution generated in America. Those power companies that would build highly polluting coal fired power plants in America, and their backers on Wall Street, may need to reconsider their plans.

We will work with the new administration to usher in an era where our abundant renewable domestic energy sources; wind, solar and geothermal, will be tapped for the benefit of all Americans, our economy, and the climate of our planet.

We're hopeful the new administration will reverse the mad rush to develop oil and gas resources in the Arctic until we've had an opportunity to comply with existing environmental laws and learn how to protect the ocean, wildlife and lands of the Arctic.

We're also blessed with the strongest environmental laws of any nation and a citizenry empowered to enforce them. Earthjustice expects to continue helping average Americans stand up for the places they love and the environment we all share. We have no doubt the new administration will be beset by those powers that sat at the right hand of the vice president and will fight any attempt to reduce their access to America's natural resources. Earthjustice looks forward to partnering with the new administration to safeguard America's natural treasures from these interests and to pressuring the administration if it fails to do so.

As the new president prepares to take office, our country's rivers, lakes, and streams have far too much pollution, both industrial and agricultural, coursing through them. These waters are the lifeblood of America. The oceans off our coasts suffer from pollution and in some places, over fishing. We're hopeful the new administration will have the wisdom to address these problems and we vow to work with them to do so.

We expect the new administration will appreciate the enormous amount of energy that can easily be had here at home by simply adopting energy efficient standards derived from existing, off-the-shelf technology. We look to the new administration to address the critical need to build and support mass transit.

The new administration will be wise to embrace the power of the American entrepreneurial spirit which has shown again and again that it can innovate like no other and bring fresh technology to the world. Let that innovation now bring forth the technologies that will help America and other nations all around the world generate cleaner energy and clean up their pollution.