Green-collar jobs poised for growth
| By Dennis Spisak - Jan 7th, 2009 at 5:48 am EST |
Green-collar jobs poised for growth
Jan 5, 2009 Tennessean
Marla Dickerson HEMLOCK, Mich. -- While Detroit's automakers struggle to rebuild their sputtering operations, the key to jump-starting Michigan's economy may lie 80 miles northwest of the Motor City. This is the home of Hemlock Semiconductor Corp. It makes a material crucial for constructing photovoltaic panels. And that has turned this snow-covered hamlet into an unlikely hotbed for solar energy. The same week that General Motors Corp. and Chrysler begged $17.4 billion from taxpayers to stave off collapse, Hemlock announced a $3 billion expansion that could create hundreds of jobs. (It also has plans to build a new plant in Clarksville, Tenn.) It's a rare piece of good news for this battered Rust Belt state, whose 9.6 percent unemployment rate is the nation's highest. In contrast to Detroit iron, Hemlock's quartz-based polycrystalline silicon is in such demand that workers toil round the clock to get it to customers around the globe. Hemlock has been deluged with applications from idle factory hands such as former autoworker Don Sloboda. The 50-year-old Saginaw resident has been retraining at a local community college for what he hopes is the region's new engine of job growth. "It looks like the future to me," he said. Whether clean energy can pull Michigan out of the ditch remains to be seen. But the push is on to retool America with so-called green-collar industries. Obama plans spending President-elect Barack Obama wants to spend $150 billion over the next decade to promote energy from the sun, wind and other renewable sources, as well as energy conservation. Plans include raising vehicle fuel-economy standards and subsidizing consumer purchases of plug-in hybrids. Obama wants to weatherize 1 million homes annually and upgrade the nation's electrical grid. His team has talked of providing tax credits and loan guarantees to clean-energy companies. His goals: Create 5 million new jobs repowering America over 10 years, assert U.S. leadership on global climate change and wean the United States from its dependence on imported petroleum. Americans have heard it before. Every U.S. president since Richard Nixon has touted energy independence, yet the goal remains elusive. The United States imported less than one-third of its crude around the time of the Arab oil embargo in 1973. Today foreigners feed nearly 60 percent of the nation's petroleum habit. Skeptics fear that the president-elect's Green New Deal will do little but waste taxpayer's money. The government squandered billions on the Jimmy Carter-era synthetic-fuels program, a failed effort to create vehicle fuel from coal. Corn-based ethanol -- the latest recipient of fat subsidies -- is loathed by many environmentalists, who say it's an inefficient fuel that gobbles precious cropland and helps to drive up food prices. Renewable energy proponents, such as former California Treasurer Phil Angelides, say it would be stupid to stick with current U.S. energy policy, which has turbocharged global warming, super-sized the trade deficit and propped up oil-rich regimes hostile to American interests. Job estimates vary No one knows precisely how many green jobs exist in the U.S. economy. Estimates range from less than 1 million workers to nearly four times that number. What's clear is clean industries have been growing rapidly without a lot of help from Uncle Sam. Worldwide, investors poured a record $117.2 billion into alternative energy in 2007, according to the London-based research firm New Energy Finance. Costs of wind and solar power are dropping fast. But the industry slowed in late 2008 as the U.S. financial system imploded. Plunging oil prices and frozen credit markets have derailed a number of renewable energy projects. Some advocates say U.S. government support is needed to keep the sector moving forward.
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Green Jobs-Moving America Forward!
Dennis Spisak
Mahoning Valley Greens
Ohio Green Party
www.ohiogreens.org
www.votespisak.org/thinkgreen/
Jan 5, 2009 Tennessean
Marla Dickerson HEMLOCK, Mich. -- While Detroit's automakers struggle to rebuild their sputtering operations, the key to jump-starting Michigan's economy may lie 80 miles northwest of the Motor City. This is the home of Hemlock Semiconductor Corp. It makes a material crucial for constructing photovoltaic panels. And that has turned this snow-covered hamlet into an unlikely hotbed for solar energy. The same week that General Motors Corp. and Chrysler begged $17.4 billion from taxpayers to stave off collapse, Hemlock announced a $3 billion expansion that could create hundreds of jobs. (It also has plans to build a new plant in Clarksville, Tenn.) It's a rare piece of good news for this battered Rust Belt state, whose 9.6 percent unemployment rate is the nation's highest. In contrast to Detroit iron, Hemlock's quartz-based polycrystalline silicon is in such demand that workers toil round the clock to get it to customers around the globe. Hemlock has been deluged with applications from idle factory hands such as former autoworker Don Sloboda. The 50-year-old Saginaw resident has been retraining at a local community college for what he hopes is the region's new engine of job growth. "It looks like the future to me," he said. Whether clean energy can pull Michigan out of the ditch remains to be seen. But the push is on to retool America with so-called green-collar industries. Obama plans spending President-elect Barack Obama wants to spend $150 billion over the next decade to promote energy from the sun, wind and other renewable sources, as well as energy conservation. Plans include raising vehicle fuel-economy standards and subsidizing consumer purchases of plug-in hybrids. Obama wants to weatherize 1 million homes annually and upgrade the nation's electrical grid. His team has talked of providing tax credits and loan guarantees to clean-energy companies. His goals: Create 5 million new jobs repowering America over 10 years, assert U.S. leadership on global climate change and wean the United States from its dependence on imported petroleum. Americans have heard it before. Every U.S. president since Richard Nixon has touted energy independence, yet the goal remains elusive. The United States imported less than one-third of its crude around the time of the Arab oil embargo in 1973. Today foreigners feed nearly 60 percent of the nation's petroleum habit. Skeptics fear that the president-elect's Green New Deal will do little but waste taxpayer's money. The government squandered billions on the Jimmy Carter-era synthetic-fuels program, a failed effort to create vehicle fuel from coal. Corn-based ethanol -- the latest recipient of fat subsidies -- is loathed by many environmentalists, who say it's an inefficient fuel that gobbles precious cropland and helps to drive up food prices. Renewable energy proponents, such as former California Treasurer Phil Angelides, say it would be stupid to stick with current U.S. energy policy, which has turbocharged global warming, super-sized the trade deficit and propped up oil-rich regimes hostile to American interests. Job estimates vary No one knows precisely how many green jobs exist in the U.S. economy. Estimates range from less than 1 million workers to nearly four times that number. What's clear is clean industries have been growing rapidly without a lot of help from Uncle Sam. Worldwide, investors poured a record $117.2 billion into alternative energy in 2007, according to the London-based research firm New Energy Finance. Costs of wind and solar power are dropping fast. But the industry slowed in late 2008 as the U.S. financial system imploded. Plunging oil prices and frozen credit markets have derailed a number of renewable energy projects. Some advocates say U.S. government support is needed to keep the sector moving forward.
----------------------------------------------
Green Jobs-Moving America Forward!
Dennis Spisak
Mahoning Valley Greens
Ohio Green Party
www.ohiogreens.org
www.votespisak.org/thinkgreen/
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