Via Tom Friedman’s New York Times column, here’s a draft memo from the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board on Energy, the Environment and Technology:

We have already described the importance of the environmental impact of climate policy. It has an important competitive impact as well. If the U.S. fails to adopt an economy-wide carbon abatement program, we will continue to cede leadership in energy technology to other nations. The U.S. is now home to only two of the ten largest solar Photo-Voltaic producers in the world, two of the top ten wind turbine producers and one of the top ten advanced battery manufacturers. That is, only one-sixth of the top renewable energy manufacturers are based in the United States. To lose our advantage in technologies that were pioneered in the U.S. may cost us dearly if not reversed.

Sustainable technologies in solar, wind, electric vehicles, nuclear and other innovations will, in the view of many on our board, drive the future global economy. We can either invest in policies to build U.S. leadership in these new industries and jobs today, or we can continue with business as usual and buy windmills from Europe, batteries from Japan and solar panels from Asia.

The new green economy could be transformational for our country. Compare it to the internet. Fifteen years ago there was no web browser. There was no internet at your fingertips, no ecommerce, no search engines. Now, the internet has transformed our lives: how we learn and inform, how we entertain and communicate, how we buy and sell goods. Today, the internet economy is estimated at $1 trillion with 1.5 billion internet users worldwide—and growing.

The new green economy has greater potential. Energy is a large and growing global market with 4 billion users of electricity—and usage doubling in 25 years. It is perhaps the largest economic opportunity of the 21st century. With the right policies driving innovation and investment, America can retake the lead in energy technology and create millions of new green jobs and industries, preserve millions of indirect jobs and repower our economy.

Unfortunately, that’s a lot harder to chant than “drill, baby, drill,” and it won’t fit on a bumper sticker.

In recent years China has been moving ahead of us in green technology. James Fallows has written some articles for The Atlantic on this; see especially “China’s Silver Lining” from the June 2008 issue. Yes, China has been a horrific polluter. But in his column Friedman quotes Hal Harvey, the chief executive of ClimateWorks:

“They want to be leaders in green technology. China has already adopted the most aggressive energy efficiency program in the world. It is committed to reducing the energy intensity of its economy — energy used per dollar of goods produced — by 20 percent in five years. They are doing this by implementing fuel efficiency standards for cars that far exceed our own and by going after their top thousand industries with very aggressive efficiency targets. And they have the most aggressive renewable energy deployment in the world, for wind, solar and nuclear, and are already beating their targets.”

Although Friedman is not clear in exactly what we are lagging behind, we are apparently lagging behind Japan, Europe, and China (in that order) in something related to new energy technology.

Why is it so hard for us to commit to even keeping up with green technology? Oh, yes. We have to fight the Right about it.

Remember when that great meathead Reagan — excuse me, Saint Ronald of Blessed Memory — ripped the solar panels off the White House? That signaled to the Right that to be pro-environment is to be a wuss, and possibly a liberal-socialist wuss. I might argue that this works for manufacturers too, but … what manufacturers? Do we still have any?

Anyway, I think 99 percent of the Right’s pathological refusal to back anything with the prefixes “enviro-” or “eco-” attached to them dates to that. Their lips would curl up and fall off their faces if they had to admit maybe, about something, Jimmy Carter was right and Reagan was wrong. They’ll pawn the whole bleeping country to China first.