White House Rewards Agencies’ Sustainability Work in Market Push

The White House on Tuesday will double down on its strategy of encouraging green investment by sending out market signals in the form of presidential recognition for 10 federal agencies’ sustainability work.

It’s a strategy the Biden administration has been using since it took office, in an effort to bolster the markets for green products like electric vehicles and renewable energy.

For example, the federal government has ordered more than 58,000 EVs over the last three years, representing nearly 10% of its total fleet of 600,000 vehicles, according to a White House official. The Biden administration has also signed agreements to provide federal facilities in 16 states with 100% carbon-free energy by 2030.

To draw further attention to federal success stories, White House officials will give Presidential Federal Sustainability Awards on Tuesday to agencies like the US Postal Service for committing to introduce 66,000 electric delivery trucks over the next five years and installing 14,000 charging ports. That plan represents a sharp reversal of the Postal Service’s earlier pledge to modernize its fleet with mostly gas-powered vehicles.

Other awards will go to the US Air Force for building a 4,000-acre solar project at Edwards Air Force Base in Southern California; the Interior Department for significantly cutting plastic pollution; and the General Services Administration for embarking on a plan to electrify the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center—the biggest building in Washington, D.C.

The Energy Department will be recognized for transforming federal lands into sites for utility-scale clean energy generation, as will the State Department for procuring 100% clean electricity for the US Embassy and consulates in Japan, and the Department of Transportation and GSA for building the John A. Volpe National Transportation Systems Center in Cambridge, Mass., in a way that replaces aging buildings and huge parking lots with a new energy-efficient, climate-resilient federal building.

The departments of the Treasury and Homeland Security, along with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, will also be recognized.

“Our federal government is the nation’s largest energy consumer, building and vehicle owner, and purchaser of goods and services, and the Biden-Harris administration remains committed to being good stewards of taxpayer dollars,” Brenda Mallory, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said in a statement.

The administration’s plan has faced some uncertainty, as many private sector companies and developers say they’re not sold on switching vendors, changing practices they’ve been using for decades, or paying more for green products.

But the strategy seems to be working, according to the General Services Administration, which last month said it had found that manufacturers have published tens of thousands of new environmental product declarations over the past year, showing that the market wants materials made with lower emissions and that industry is providing them.