People often wonder why Congress is so comfortable passing laws that promote policies that the House and Senate do not themselves seem much bothered to adhere to. The environmental impact of Congress itself, as an institution, had more or less escaped scrutiny until recently, when Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that the House of Representatives would undertake a green initiative to reduce that body's carbon impact.
This effort is itself formidable: Congressional office buildings and the Capitol building itself are aging, of various ages and technologies that present issues in almost every area of environmental concern one can name: insulation, asbestos abatement, window performance, scads of lightbulbs of every age and variety, heating and cooling systems that are often clumsy retrofits or inefficient leftovers from the days of cheap oil and carbon-obliviousness.
Taking the House building complex carbon neutral is not politically neutral, either. The House power plant is fueled with coal, and members representing coal states are not thrilled by the prospect of declaring a staple of their states' economies deemed obsolete and undesireable by the nation's legislative branch.
The House's chief administrative officer, Daniel P. Beard, provided Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer a Preliminary Report on the Green the Capitol Initiative. In that report, five areas of focus are recommended for making the House complex a "showcase for sustainability;" these recommendations take into consideration changes in everything from lightbulbs and photocopies to vehicles and vendors.
The Preliminary Report can downloaded as a pdf file from Live Green, Live Smart's Library.