Washington, D.C. – Gregory Wetstone has overseen government affairs for the American Wind Energy Association, a Washington trade group, for a year.

“Nonstop action,” he says of his tenure.

The action will stay intense in the near term. Next week, Wetstone expects a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives on his group’s most important legislative priority, a long-term extension of the wind energy production tax credit (PTC). The subsidy provides an income tax credit of two cents per kilowatt hour for electricity produced by windmills. Since its creation in 1992, the PTC has expired on three occasions, each a big setback for the wind business. It’s set to expire again at the end of this year.

Wetstone predicts the PTC will make it through the House, as it did when that body passed a broad energy package in December. Prospects look difficult, however, in the U.S. Senate, where partisan maneuvering and disputes over funding offsets have caused the PTC to twice fall short of passage in recent months. (See: “Why The Energy Bill Will Die.”)

Full story at Forbes.com

Washington, D.C. – A modest crowd of 50 or so gathered Wednesday in Washington, D.C., for a conference on global warming. The event, organized by a fledgling trade association called the Carbon Management Council, contemplated impacts on business as governments seek to check global warming with restrictions on carbon emissions.

The crowd may have been small, but the discussion covered the major–and relatively immediate–implications of climate change.

One of those implications: Given the emerging regulatory response to global warming, all businesses should get their ducks in a row now when it comes to keeping track of their output of carbon dioxide and other gases blamed for climate change.

“The assumption is going to be that, as an organization, you will already have your data in line,” said Jerry Schmits, a conference panelist and director of product marketing for expense-management consultancy Cadence Network. “All this is going to almost act like the next Sarbanes-Oxley.”

Full story at Forbes.com

Washington, D.C. – Like any big industry, energy has an array of trade groups representing its various sectors and sub-sectors inside the Beltway. Biofuels, coal, gas, oil, nukes, solar, wind, utilities of various stripes: They all field associations that jostle for position on energy policy.

Since 1981, Jeffrey Serfass has made a living in this milieu. The approach behind his $2 million (revenues) Washington consultancy: connect the dots.

“We have a significant network of companies and spheres of knowledge that allow us to uniquely bridge the entire gamut from fossil fuels to renewable energy,” says Serfass, 62.

Suitably, Serfass’ company carries a rather non-descript name: Technology Transition Corporation. In addition to corporate and government consulting, the 12-person, for-profit outfit manages trade groups, notably the National Hydrogen Association and the internationally focused Partnership for Advancing the Transition to Hydrogen. Serfass heads both organizations.

Full story at Forbes.com

Washington, D.C. – As the table below indicates, Wall Street has cooled on the coal business lately. Particularly hard hit, in share price terms at least, have been two concerns, Headwaters and Rentech, specializing in turning coal into liquid fuel.

At a Wednesday hearing on Capitol Hill, those two companies pleaded for Washington to nurture the fledgling coal-to-liquid industry.

“Oil price volatility continues to discourage potential [coal-to-liquid] investors,” Robert Freerks, Rentech’s (amex: RTK – news – people ) director of product development, told the House Committee on Science and Technology’s Subcommittee on Energy and Environment. “Congress should enact policy to help reduce risk and encourage investment in these plants.”

“Until we get the first few plants built, there’s tremendous resistance from the private capital market,” agreed John Ward, Headwaters’ (nyse: HW – news – people ) vice president for marketing and government affairs (note: half of Headwaters’ sales come from residential construction materials).

As we’ve observed elsewhere, (See: “Its Not Easy Being Green”], Washington tends to stand by long-shot energy technologies, even after the stock market has given them the thumbs-down. But the members at today’s hearing weren’t an easy audience.

Full story at Forbes.com

As interest in all things green has surged, business groups in Washington have jumped cheerfully in. But as one association’s initiative illustrates, these high-profile efforts aren’t without risks.

In September, 2005, chief executives from Dow Chemical, Sun Microsystems, Xerox and three others joined then Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist at an event near the White House to tout a new initiative called S.E.E. Change.

Sponsored by the Business Roundtable, an advocacy group representing 150 bosses of big companies, the initiative set out to burnish business “as a force for good” in matters of society and environment. Along with the event, the Roundtable took out full-page ads in several big newspapers and won widespread press coverage, including an item on Forbes.com.

In Pictures: A Gallery Of Green Spin
The progress so far? S.E.E. Change (which stands for Society, Environment and Economy) has added 10 new members to a founding roster of 18 companies who committed to showcasing and tracking their sustainability efforts. Not an insignificant increase, but a long way from the S.E.E. objective of getting all 150 Business Roundtable companies on board.

“It’s an aspirational goal,” says Marian Hopkins, director of public policy for the Business Roundtable. “[S.E.E. Change participants] can be great advocates to other member companies.”

Full story at Forbes.com