President Obama has signed an executive order directing each federal government agency to measure its greenhouse-gas emissions and set targets to reduce them by 2020. The measure affects such things as the electricity federal buildings consume and the carbon output of federal workers' commutes. Each agency must report its 2020 emission targets to the Council on Environmental Quality within 90 days.
Administration officials said they could not estimate the federal government's carbon footprint, since it has never been measured before, but the government ranks as the nation's largest energy consumer. It occupies nearly 500,000 buildings, operates more than 600,000 vehicles and employs more than 1.8 million civilian workers.
Under the executive order, all federal agencies will have to meet a series of environmental targets over the next decade. They include 50% recycling and waste diversion by 2015; a 30% reduction in vehicle-fleet petroleum use by 2020; and a 26% improvement in water efficiency by 2020.
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