• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, March 4, 2009

Becoming green makes a company like Google more profitable, the company's CEO told CNBC's Bill Griffeth during an interview Wednesday evening.

Rebuilding the energy infrastructure of the U.S. to make the country less reliant on oil will create many new jobs and drive innovation, according to Google CEO Eric Schmidt. Jobs will be created in factories that build batteries for cars and new technologies for windmills. Putting all those together creates an industry remade right before our eyes, and a country less dependent on foreign oil, he said.

During the interview with Griffeth and guest host Andrew Ross Sorkin, the New York Times reporter, Schmidt said he's bullish on mobile advertising--suggesting the medium can target consumers more easily. "They should be worth more, advertisers should be willing to pay more, and there should be greater conversions, which is ultimately what advertising is about," he said.

Consumers have more powerful browsers on mobile devices such as Apple's iPhones, Google's G1, and Research In Motion's BlackBerry. Suddenly people are using cell phones for more than voice communication and email. There's a whole new generation of applications such as Twitter becoming available on mobile devices.

At the Morgan Stanley technology conference in San Francisco on Tuesday, Schmidt called Twitter a poor man's email. The comment sparked speculation that Google might try to buy them. "We admire Twitter and think they did a very good job of exposing a whole new way to communicate," he said, suggesting that people will combine the use of email, Twitter, Facebook and other platforms.

Asked whether Google plans to make acquisitions, Schmidt said a few companies have been considered, but he doesn't think prices have hit their low. Although economic forecasting is as hard as predicting the future in technology, it's obvious the economy hasn't hit bottom and it could take quarters for it to do so, he said.

The recovery will begin in the U.S., he said. Companies are still tightening budgets, battening down hatches for the long haul. "My personal view is 2009 will be a very tough year, and we're looking at 2010," he said. "We benefit by the shift from offline to online advertising, but I want to be clear that all forms of advertising, including ours, will be affected by the slowdown. I don't think Google is recession-proof."