Austin has a sad showing

A clean, green, job-growing machine: Houston tops Texas in green jobs, ranksninth in country

The low-carbon economy can be tricky to gauge because jobs with a positive green impact occupy all sectors and are difficult to count. Plus, the genre is still being defined.

Those daunting restrictions didn't stop the Brookings Institution from ranking the nation's 100 top local clean economies. With 39,986 green jobs in the region, Houston ranks ninth on the list.

Leading the pack is New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island with 152,034 green jobs, followed by LA, Chicago, Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia. Houston ranks above other supposedly green metropolises like Seattle, Portland and Austin. The Texas capital ranks a sad No. 36 with a mere 14,554 green jobs. Nearby San Antonio fairs even worse at No. 48. Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown ranks just above Dallas-Fort Worth and its 38,562 green jobs.

So what exactly is a green job? Among the Houston green employers profiled by Brookings are professional environmental services company Aker Solutions, geothermal Calpine Corp and renewable energy services GDF Suez Energy. Horizon Wind Energy LLC and metal coil coating corporation NCI Group, Inc. are also recognized.

To develop the rankings, Brookings analyzed the sector of the economy that produces goods and services with an environmental benefit. In the report, "the clean economy is divided into 39 distinct segments, reflecting economic activity involved in producing a broad spectrum of clean products, from goods such as wind turbines and solar photovoltaics to services such as mass transit and regulation."

The widest growth has taken place in the realms of professional environmental services and recycling and reuse. Between 2003 and 2010, the green economy grew by 5.3 percent annually in Houston. That leads to more money in green workers' pockets — the estimated median wage in Houston's clean economy is $42,779 compared to $38,608 for all jobs in the city.

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Thanks, Queen Bey

Pop icon Beyoncé donates $100,000 to University of Houston Law School

Photo by Erza Shaw Getty Images

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Pop megastar Beyoncé Knowles-Carter has donated $100,000 to the University of Houston Law Center Criminal Justice Clinic through her BeyGOOD Foundation. The gift will allow the clinic to hire fill-time faculty to head it, benefiting the students who study there.

“I am delighted that the BeyGOOD Foundation has made this very generous gift to the UH Law Center,” said Leonard Baynes, dean of the UH Law Center. “Not only will this funding help establish a full-time criminal justice clinic that provides pro bono legal services in our community, but it will also supercharge our already excellent criminal law and justice programming.”

The clinic is one of nine at UHLC. It helps students learn to navigate the criminal justice system, especially on behalf of clients that are underserved by skilled attorneys. People of color are affected disproportionately by a lack of good, ethical representation.

Beyoncé, the most decorated artist in Grammy history and easily the biggest musical star native to Houston, has a long history of advocating for criminal justice reform. She was a staunch supporter of the police reform following the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, asking law enforcement to “stop killing us” in a web post. In 2020, she penned an open letter to the Kentucky attorney general asking for justice in the death of Breonna Taylor.

Through her BeyGOOD Foundation, established in 2013, Beyoncé has focused mostly on expanding the prospects of Black-owned business and offering education opportunities to students. Forwarding the cause of legal representation in Texas while also helping out marginalized communities compliments her other philanthropic work.

“At UH Law, we envision a legal profession where ‘everyone has the opportunity to prosper,’ as BeyGOOD envisions, and we will achieve this vision by providing access to strong and effective legal representation in criminal proceedings,” Baynes said. “And together, through this gift, the BeyGOOD Foundation and UHLC will shepherd the next generation of criminal justice attorneys in the city of Houston, the state of Texas and the nation.”