WASHINGTON-
Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter took his push to develop renewable energy to Washington in meetings with fellow governors Monday.
Visiting the nation’s capital for the National Governors Association winter meeting and other conferences, Ritter laid out his plan for developing wind, solar and biofuels in a speech to a group promoting clean energy.
He also hoped to talk with other governors about how states can use less oil.
But by midmorning he had come up short on one of his goals. During a morning meeting at the White House, he didn’t get a chance to lobby President Bush to reverse a proposed 3 percent budget cut for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colo.
The meeting between governors and the administration was dominated by questions about the National Guard’s role in Iraq and a government health insurance program for children and families, he said.
Ritter said he might take his concerns about NREL “through other channels.”
Even a small decrease would be a mistake when the energy industry desperately needs research data on wind, solar and other renewable sources, he said.
“The wrong direction would be to in any way reduce funding,” he said. “Thinking about it now will make such a difference in 20 or 30 years.”
Ritter, whose campaign last year pushed for clean energy, opened the day speaking at a conference hosted by the Apollo Alliance, a coalition of labor, business and environmental groups lobbying for a renewable energy plan.
He appeared with Democratic Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, who said industry and the states will have to lead the nation to move away from dependence on oil. Bush opposes mandatory caps on the greenhouse gases, while several states and even energy companies are pushing to create a national plan to reduce emissions.
Ritter and Patrick said developing renewable energy will create hundreds of new jobs. Patrick promised to make Massachusetts the renewable energy capital, while Ritter countered that Colorado was “going to arm-wrestle you for those jobs.”
With a nod to union groups represented at the conference, Ritter pledged that many of those jobs in Colorado would go to organized labor. The governor angered unions two weeks ago when he vetoed a measure that would have made it easier to set up all-union workplaces.
Ritter backs bills in the Legislature that would require utilities to generate 20 percent of their energy from renewable sources by 2020 and that would help expand transmission lines, now a barrier to expanding the use of wind and other renewables.
Still, Colorado lags behind some states, including California, which passed the nation’s first law imposing mandatory emissions caps.
California’s law seeks to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. New Jersey’s Gov. Jon S. Corzine signed an executive order earlier this month committing the state to a similar program.
On Monday, the governors of Arizona, California, New Mexico, Oregon and Washington agreed to develop a regional target to lower greenhouse gases and create a program aimed at helping businesses reach the still-undecided goals.
Some state conservation groups, including Environment Colorado, Environmental Defense and Western Resource Advocates, urged Colorado to join.
Ritter, who took office in January, said he was looking into it. He said he had just been given a briefing paper about the program, which the other states have been negotiating for months.
Carbon dioxide produced from the burning of fossil fuels is a significant source of greenhouse gases. U.S. emissions have increased an average of about 1 percent year since 1990.
