"You’re hired!’
That’s what the governors of 24 states who are part of the U.S. Climate Alliance hope they can soon say to a million apprentices that they’re aiming to train for careers in climate action and clean energy, by 2035.
Leaders of the Alliance and hundreds of other climate activists are in New York City for Climate Week, the largest event of its kind. It takes place in partnership with the United Nations General Assembly and the City of New York.
Among the featured speakers is Washington Governor Jay Inslee, who helped make the apprenticeship announcement along with Alliance co-chairs Kathy Hochul, Governor of New York, and Michelle Lujan Grisham, Governor of New Mexico. White House National Climate Advisor Ali Zaidi also spoke.
Inslee praised the initiative as a feel-good opportunity and another way to build hope in the face of climate disasters. He said Washington state has already hired lots of young people for these kinds of positions. He told the story of meeting a young woman recently who was helping build a hydrogen-powered airplane at a startup company in Moses Lake.
“I said, ‘What experience do you have?’ She said, ‘Well, I'm a high school graduate, and I want to build hydrogen power airplanes. And now this company has given me a chance, through kind of an apprenticeship program, to learn the skills to do that.’”
The Washington governor said he asked her how it felt and she smiled from ear to ear.
It’s Inslee’s last time at Climate Week as a sitting governor. He delivered the opening keynote and is scheduled to speak six times in less than two days during the conference.
On the first day of the conference, Inslee was heralded as a pioneer of local climate action. His key message: the importance of what he calls “super-national” leadership on climate action – reminding local leaders that they can act faster on climate issues than most federal governments can.
He co-founded the U.S. Climate Alliance seven years ago, with the governors of New York and California. It now has 24 member states, representing more than half the U.S. population and almost 60% of the economy.
“You know, a quarter of a century ago, I had this, what I called a vision that others called a hallucination that we could build a clean energy economy in the United States and lead the world to a brighter future…” Inslee said, to a crowd full of laughter.
He said now, federal climate spending like the Inflation Reduction Act is “supercharging” state efforts – which will grow even further with the new apprenticeship initiative announced at Climate Week.
“When you put a little policy, together with brilliant entrepreneurs and really skilled people in layer, you can create a new economy,” he said.
During the opening keynote, he struck an upbeat tone -- quoting words shared by oceanographer Sylvia Earle, who spoke at the recent opening of the new Ocean Pavilion at Seattle Aquarium — as he talked about current efforts to take climate action.
“And she talked about the fact that we are in a unique time in human history,” Inslee said. “No other time in human history have people been able to come together to fundamentally change life on the planet. This is a very unique moment, and so these are great days, and these are days where we can and are making a difference.”
His optimism was undeterred by efforts in his home state to undo his signature Climate Commitment Act with a voter initiative that would also ban all future cap and tax policies to regulate carbon emissions. Inslee was in his element among like-minded activists who are determined to turn the tide on climate change.
“You can make a difference. Everybody in this room can make a difference. And I hope you go home from New York and realize that dream. We're going to tame this beast. We are going to build the best clean energy economy in the world,” he said.
