This past week, the Texas AFL-CIO announced the launch of the Texas Climate Jobs Project, a new initiative based on a report by climate and policy researchers at Cornell University. The report recommends using tax credits to expand carbon capture, installing solar panels to Texas public schools, electrifying school buses, and more. The report states that Texas’s transition from fossil fuels to clean energy could create more than 1.1 million jobs over the next 25 years and emphasizes that those newly created jobs be high-quality, union jobs.
“Texas AFT is solidly behind a simple idea promoted by this project—that you can have well-paying jobs and a solid economy while taking bold action on climate change,” said Texas AFT President Zeph Capo.
Twenty-seven labor unions, including Texas AFT, will be participating in the effort after delegates at the Texas AFL-CIO convention voted overwhelmingly to adopt a resolution endorsing the plan outlined by the report. Bo Delp, formerly a political organizer for Unite Here Local 23 and Better Builder Director at the Workers Defense Project, was chosen as the executive director of the Texas Climate Jobs Project.
“We must ensure that working people thrive in this clean energy transition,” Delp said. “If we cannot solve that problem, our ability to meaningfully address climate change will be much more difficult.”
For more information on the Texas Climate Jobs Project, visit their website. For updates, follow on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.