There seems to have been misuse and waste of initial $300-plus billion from the $700 billion Troubled Assets Rescue Package, or TARP. There has been a lack of accountability, transparency and oversight. Some of the stories we know about include: the $400,000 AIG parties, huge salaries and bonuses to bank executives, and banks using the money to buy other financial institutions. I thought that TARP was to rescue homeowners with subprime adjustable rate mortgages, the housing industry and restart the credit markets to assure flow of capital. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson needs to show the U.S. taxpayer that the money he has given away is being used properly or that it is returned to the Treasury.

I hope that the current Bush administration and new Obama administration will decide that the current economic recession is the time to develop clean power and energy-efficient technologies not because it feels good but because it is the smartest, most efficient, lowest-cost way – when all the true costs are included – to do things. Clean power and energy efficiency are “going to become the defining measure of a country’s economic standing, environmental health, energy security and national security over the next fifty years.” (“Hot, Flat and Crowded” by Thomas Friedman).

Here are my four uses for the remaining $370 billion:

First, there would be a green vehicle fund of $50 billion with a mandate to increase fuel efficiency at least 4 percent a year per vehicle type and make major investments in new battery technology for plug-in hybrids. This would save hundreds of thousands of jobs and create new ones.

Second, there would be a green efficiency fund of $130 billion to make public buildings (including schools), businesses and homes more energy efficient. Multimillion dollar prizes would be given to those who redesign refrigerators, windows, doors, air conditioners, LED lighting, furnaces, insulation, washing machines, building envelope materials, roofing, computers, televisions, water heaters, built-in energy monitoring devices and energy meters that increase energy efficiency by 20 percent.

It can be done. Most of the designs probably are already there in some corporate computer or brilliant inventor’s mind. Some already are used in Europe and Japan – places that use much less energy than we do. These new devices need to be widely used within the next eight to 10 years. Energy-efficiency actions could help rebuild the construction, building materials, and appliance industries. Many million jobs would be saved or created.

Third, there would be a new $130 billion infrastructure fund. Rebuilding roads, bridges, ports, mass transit, wastewater treatment, storm-water management, potable water facilities, railroads, transmission lines, building new “fueling” infrastructure (natural gas, biofuels, electric plug-in stations), building new small, clean combined heat and power stations that could heat and light neighborhoods would take another $130 billion. These need to be designed to take account of the changes due to climate change – sea level rise, storm surges, intense rainfall, drought, higher winds, and wildfires. Many million jobs would be saved or created.

Fourth, $60 billion immediately has to go to the states and cities to maintain the disintegrating safety net and educational systems. This aid also would save and create jobs.

Outside of the TARP funds, there would be sensible and long-term tax credits for solar, wind, tidal, geothermal, biomass, and biofuels to ensure that investors can recover their initial investments regardless of the price of oil. These credits will be paid for by removing the tax credits for coal, oil and gas and adding a small carbon tax on coal and oil to help level the playing field. Natural gas is much cleaner, has less carbon and is a transition fuel – it is economically viable and does not need tax dollars but should not have the carbon tax at this point. More jobs would be saved and created.

Please call our Maine Congressional Delegation today and ask them to mandate that the U.S. Treasury stop giving money without specific conditions to banks and give it instead with strong conditions to the various public and private sectors that can rebuild the U.S. economy to save and create jobs. We do not have any money or time to waste.

Pam Person of Orland has been involved in clean energy and environmental policy issues since 1992 at the local, state, regional, national and international levels.