SAN MARCOS -- An environmental group held several news conferences around the state Thursday, including one in North County, to release a report that calls on President-elect Barack Obama and Congress to invest $142 billion in green energy and transportation.

"Big Oil, King Coal, the road builders and other polluting interests want to dominate the economic recovery program," Andrew Bauer, state field director for Sacramento-based Environment California, said in a news conference outside the San Marcos Civic Center.

Instead, Bauer said, much of the money in the Obama administration's economic stimulus plan should be pumped into sun and wind power projects and buses and trains that are much cleaner than fossil-fuel plants and cars.

"If we continue on business as usual with dirty energy and highways to nowhere we will be laying the groundwork for decades of global warming pollution," he said.

But the group's report asserts that a $142 billion investment in a green future would slash emissions of greenhouse gases that cause global warming by 10 percent nationwide, while creating 3 million jobs -- roughly the amount lost in 2008.

Bauer said his group scheduled the local event for San Marcos to call attention to the city's plans to change out an old climate control system at the Civic Center with an efficient one that substantially reduces energy use. That's the kind of project, he said, that should be the focus of the economic stimulus plan.

Asked whether the group considered San Diego Gas & Electric Co.'s Sunrise Powerlink transmission line as an example of a green project the nation should be promoting, Bauer said no.

"We are not opposed to power lines in general," he said. "In fact, we support them. I mean, we need to get that green power to the people. But the Sunrise power line was bad on multiple fronts."

The $1.9 billion Sunrise Powerlink has been billed as a tool for shipping green electricity from solar and wind plants in Imperial Valley to San Diego County, and the California Public Utilities Commission cited the state's goal to ramp up investments in green energy when it approved the project last month.

However, environmental groups opposed the 123-mile power line on the grounds it would harm the backcountry environment and Cleveland National Forest while increasing the risk of wildfire.

The report recommends investing:

- $62.3 billion in green, renewable energy such as sun, wind and geothermal power. That would generate 833,000 jobs, the group says. Whereas California has set a goal of putting solar panels on the rooftops of 1 million homes statewide, the group wants to see panels on 10 million roofs nationwide. It also wants to see a national mandate that 25 percent of the nation's electricity come from green sources by 2025. California has set a goal of 33 percent by 2020.

- $21 billion in energy efficiency programs. The goal is to retrofit office buildings, factories and homes so that they stay cooler in summer and warmer in winter, resulting in less energy use. This, the group says, would create 430,000 jobs.

- $59 billion in public transportation, such as buses and commuter trains, and clean automobile fuels. According to the group, this strategy would create 1.5 million jobs.

Contact staff writer Dave Downey at (760) 745-6611, Ext. 2623, or ddowney@nctimes.com.