The US economy is definitely coming back and it will be interesting to see how that affects environmental issues. The unemployment rate is coming down and we see things like new car sales steadily improving. In November, the automakers reported great sales results, and that was particularly true of the Big Three. With GM, Ford and Chrysler doing well, that has a ripple effect throughout the entire economy. Suppliers get busy, more workers work, and then that translates into more consumer activity.

For environmentalists, this will change the conversation if it continues. During a recession, it becomes harder to deal with issues like global warming, pollution and conservation as people are worried about jobs. Green energy investments should be a priority, but some fight them and argue we should focus on things like oil pipelines. If the economy improves, it makes it easier to argue for longer term investments that can help the environment.

The car industry offers an interesting example. Surprisingly, the Obama administration was able to push through tougher fuel economy standards even during a recession. High gas prices definitely helped. But car sales were slow as people flocked to used cars, as you can see from high used car prices in 2011 that were also tied to tight supplies. And that’s one reason new car sales are now doing well. The economy is getting better so more people are looking, but new cars are more competitive with high used car prices. Also, people get more for their trade-ins, so that used Peugeot 206 can get a great price on a trade-in.

The auto recovery is leading a broader economic rebound, so get ready to reset the environmental discussions.

Chevy Volt sales have been sluggish this year and have not met expectations. This is disappointing for those of us who want to see plug-in hybrids take off.

That may be changing as GM finally starts to promote the Volt more heavily with a commercial advertising campaign. Sales increased substantially in October, so perhaps the tide is turning. That said, one month means little and we’ll have to see if this continues.

Many companies are going green because it makes sense financially. GM is a great example, as they are installing fields of solar panels at various location.

General Motors broke ground Wednesday on a six-acre field of solar panels in front of its Detroit-Hamtramck plant as part of an effort to green the production of its Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric car.

DTE Energy will own and operate the 516-kilowatt system as part of its Solar Currents program, which is installing photovoltaic systems at sites such as Monroe County Community College and a Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan parking structure in downtown Detroit.

DTE will lower GM’s energy bill because of the solar panels, which were first reported by the Free Press. That savings, about $15,000 a year, will combine with more efficient lighting and equipment updates to lower Detroit-Hamtramck’s energy costs by nearly $3 million annually.

With the large investment GM is making in US auto plants, hopefully we’ll see this kind of progress from them on green energy around the country.

This is just one of many examples of corporate American being ahead of the curve compared to those who view alternative energy in a skeptical light. This is our future . . .

Two global agreements aim to put that right. The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) allows developed-world businesses that need to offset their pollution to buy certified emission reductions, or carbon credits, to fund the reduction or sequestering of carbon dioxide in the developing world. The Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation program (UN-REDD), launched in 2008, allows polluters to pay developing-world farmers to keep their trees, which store carbon dioxide as they grow. UNEP is working with scientists in Kenya, China, Niger and Nigeria to quantify how much carbon each ecosystem swallows — comparing the appetite of a rain forest with, say, that of a mangrove swamp — and when completed in 2012, those formulas will determine how much to pay each landowner. The UNEP’s Steiner says “farming carbon” this way is far cheaper than new technology to capture and store carbon dioxide emissions at their source.

Estimates of how much the new market is worth vary wildly. The World Bank says carbon sequestration could be worth $1.5 billion a year to Africa, while Sukhdev reckons UN-REDD will be worth an eventual $30 billion to $110 billion a year globally. Manfred Kern of agritechnology company Bayer CropScience argues that the potential for monetizing natural assets is almost infinite. There is no reason, he says, that what works for trees should not also work for earth. “For the urbanized world, soil is just dirt, mud,” Kern told a U.N. conference in Bonn in May 2008. “But soil is the source of our food, the very future of humanity. We must recognize that soil has a value higher than gold.” What is clear is the potential. “It is essential that climate change be viewed as a major development opportunity for Africa,” World Bank managing director Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said last year.

Carbon credits and trading are very controversial, but the impact on places like Africa cannot be discounted.

In his speech today about energy independence, President Obama made it clear he would not abandon nuclear energy. This may be controversial for many in light of the tragedy in Japan, but Obama pointed out the fact the nuclear energy does not emit carbon, so it’s critical if we are concerned about climate change, along with its importance for energy independence.

The key is safety. Just as with offshore drilling, the key is learning from mistakes and having a commitment to sensible regulation and safety.

It will be interesting to see how this sells to the left. On the right, this was probably necessary to get Republicans like Lindsay Graham back to the negotiating table on an energy bill.

When this city vowed a decade ago to wean itself from fossil fuels, it was a lofty aspiration, like zero deaths from traffic accidents or the elimination of childhood obesity.

But Kristianstad has already crossed a crucial threshold: the city and surrounding county, with a population of 80,000, essentially use no oil, natural gas or coal to heat homes and businesses, even during the long frigid winters. It is a complete reversal from 20 years ago, when all of their heat came from fossil fuels.

But this area in southern Sweden, best known as the home of Absolut vodka, has not generally substituted solar panels or wind turbines for the traditional fuels it has forsaken. Instead, as befits a region that is an epicenter of farming and food processing, it generates energy from a motley assortment of ingredients like potato peels, manure, used cooking oil, stale cookies and pig intestines.

A hulking 10-year-old plant on the outskirts of Kristianstad uses a biological process to transform the detritus into biogas, a form of methane. That gas is burned to create heat and electricity, or is refined as a fuel for cars.

Once the city fathers got into the habit of harnessing power locally, they saw fuel everywhere: Kristianstad also burns gas emanating from an old landfill and sewage ponds, as well as wood waste from flooring factories and tree prunings.

Over the last five years, many European countries have increased their reliance on renewable energy, from wind farms to hydroelectric dams, because fossil fuels are expensive on the Continent and their overuse is, effectively, taxed by the European Union’s emissions trading system.

But for many agricultural regions, a crucial component of the renewable energy mix has become gas extracted from biomass like farm and food waste. In Germany alone, about 5,000 biogas systems generate power, in many cases on individual farms.

This is one of many ways we could be taking advantage of recycling all of the waste we have in this country.

The Green Microgym in Portland, Ore., has all the usual stuff you’d expect — sweaty people, thump-thumping music, sleek exercise equipment — but it has some extras as well. Everywhere you look, there are power cords. And these aren’t the typical kind that let you surf the Web while you slog away on a spin cycle or elliptical machine — although you can do that too. The gym uses specially configured exercise equipment that captures the energy you create while pedaling, converts it into electricity and channels it into the power outlets.

The idea of using exercise equipment to generate electricity is not new. A gym in Hong Kong has been doing this since 2007. Lots of music festivals have turned to bicycle generators to power their concerts. And some hipster bars are even making customers pedal for a few minutes to get their pitchers of perfectly blended margaritas.

But clean (and healthy) energy is just now starting to catch on in U.S. gyms. There are now converters on exercise equipment in more than 80 locations in North America, including My Sports Clubs in New York City and Washington. “We have seen a significant increase in interest in the past six months, which is a good sign that fitness centers are ready to invest in green technologies,” says Mike Curnyn, co-founder of the Green Revolution, a Connecticut-based firm that wires bikes into a central battery that can store energy.

The article points out there there are a number of different options. Some rig the exercise equipment to channel energy directly to wall outlets, while others like Green Revolution send the energy to storage batteries. Plug Out is a brand that sends the energy directly to a standard wall outlet and the energy created is automatically used before the building draws power from the grid. Other companies are ReRev and Resource Fitness.

Expect this market to explode over the next several years.

This is good news regarding conservation and our push for energy independence.

U.S. homeowners will be able to get low-cost energy audits that rank a home’s efficiency on a scale of one to 10 and get federally insured loans for upgrades, under an Obama administration plan to be announced today.

With the new Home Energy Score, consumers will find out how their home compares with others and how much money they could save by adding insulation, sealing air leaks or doing other upgrades. Nine U.S. communities will test the score, similar to a miles-per-gallon label for cars, before it’s rolled out nationally next summer.

Information is power, and now consumers will be more informed about the energy efficiency of current homes and home they intend to purchase. This will breath more life into the market for green building materials and upgrades, and along the way our housing stock will become more energy efficient.

It will also be interesting to see how this affects the real estate market. Buyers will begin to insist on a Home Energy Score so they know how efficient their new home might be. I suspect sellers will be have an incentive to make the modest investments necessary to improve the score.

President Barack Obama tours the ZBB Energy Corporation with CEO and President Eric Apfelbach and Edward Zanger in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin today in order to tout the government’s incentives to promote green energy in the stimulus bill.

President Barack Obama said government incentives to expand clean-energy industries will help restore jobs, citing a battery maker in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, where he is highlighting the impact of the economic stimulus.

Obama used the example of ZBB Energy Corp., which is using a $1.3 million loan from the legislation to keep 12 workers on staff and eventually hire 80 more as it expands production.

“We expect our commitment to clean energy to lead to more than 800,000 jobs by 2012,” Obama said after a tour of the ZBB factory. “And that’s not just creating work in the short term; that’s going to help lay the foundation for lasting economic growth.”

It’s terribly disappointing that we have not been able to pass a comprehensive energy policy, as Republicans and coal-state Senators block progress.

Countless schools across the United States have banded together to spread their message that smoking isn’t cool. Restaurants and nightclubs across the nation have banned the smoking of cigarettes within their facilities, as the news for those that smoke continues to worsen.

With the healthy segment of the populations saying no to smoking in public places, the need for alternatives to smoking continued to grow until news of smokeless cigarettes came along to fill a need.

The water-vapor dispelled from these new cigarettes is not harmful and doesn’t contain the tar, and carcinogens that make regular cigarettes so unhealthy. Thus, the news for these new and improved smokers delights has been received quite nicely.

No longer does a driver need to air-freshen the car before picking up passengers on the way to work. No longer does the 10:15 smoke break leave an employee reeking of cigarette smoke throughout the day. No longer does the running enthusiast have to cough throughout their morning jog, and no longer do mom and dad have to hide their smoking habit from the kids.

An alternative to regular cigarettes was inevitable, as people across the country continue to smoke despite the warnings, (even on the label) that smoking can be hazardous to one’s health. With hundreds of people addicted to regular cigarettes, the news that a new and improved form or smoking is causing quite the stir. Smokers still receive their desired rush of nicotine, while those around them aren’t affected in nearly the same manner.

And that’s good news for all of us!