What he writes is truly is head-exploding:
Few Americans know it, but for almost a year now, Congress has been bickering over whether and how to renew the investment tax credit to stimulate investment in solar energy and the production tax credit to encourage investment in wind energy. The bickering has been so poisonous that when Congress passed the 2007 energy bill last December, it failed to extend any stimulus for wind and solar energy production. Oil and gas kept all their credits, but those for wind and solar have been left to expire this December. <...> "It's a disaster," says Michael Polsky, founder of Invenergy, one of the biggest wind-power developers in America. "Wind is a very capital-intensive industry, and financial institutions are not ready to take `Congressional risk.' They say if you don't get the [production tax credit] we will not lend you the money to buy more turbines and build projects." It is also alarming, says Rhone Resch, the president of the Solar Energy Industries Association, that the U.S. has reached a point "where the priorities of Congress could become so distorted by politics" that it would turn its back on the next great global industry -- clean power -- "but that's exactly what is happening." If the wind and solar credits expire, said Resch, the impact in just 2009 would be more than 100,000 jobs either lost or not created in these industries, and $20 billion worth of investments that won't be made.
"It's a disaster," says Michael Polsky, founder of Invenergy, one of the biggest wind-power developers in America. "Wind is a very capital-intensive industry, and financial institutions are not ready to take `Congressional risk.' They say if you don't get the [production tax credit] we will not lend you the money to buy more turbines and build projects."
It is also alarming, says Rhone Resch, the president of the Solar Energy Industries Association, that the U.S. has reached a point "where the priorities of Congress could become so distorted by politics" that it would turn its back on the next great global industry -- clean power -- "but that's exactly what is happening." If the wind and solar credits expire, said Resch, the impact in just 2009 would be more than 100,000 jobs either lost or not created in these industries, and $20 billion worth of investments that won't be made.
Actually, on the topic of green energy and "green jobs", Friedman has been on the ball for at least two years now. I do give him credit for that, and for am grateful to him for making it one of the major recurring themes in his columns.
Having said that, Friedman wrote this in October 2007:
"If we can get these youth in on the ground floor of the solar industry now, where they can be installers today, they'll become managers in five years and owners in 10. And then they become inventors," said Mr. Jones. "The green economy has the power to deliver new sources of work, wealth and health to low-income people -- while honoring the Earth. If you can do that, you just wiped out a whole bunch of problems. The Green-Collar Solution in October 2007
The Green-Collar Solution in October 2007
Jérôme wrote this in December 2006.
If renewable energy can create lots of jobs (and it can) while helping to solve the energy crisis, it's an obvious win-win. <...> Renewable energy is a job-rich, technology-rich industry, and it is close to being competitive on its own: smart, consistent support, even on a limited scale, can have a big effect. <...> Thus Democrats need to bring up their ideas to the business press. Remember how Jim Webb brought populism to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal? Well the same must be done about energy, because the solutions of the Democrats and the Republicans could not be more different. How to claim the energy battleground
Renewable energy is a job-rich, technology-rich industry, and it is close to being competitive on its own: smart, consistent support, even on a limited scale, can have a big effect. <...>
Thus Democrats need to bring up their ideas to the business press. Remember how Jim Webb brought populism to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal? Well the same must be done about energy, because the solutions of the Democrats and the Republicans could not be more different.
How to claim the energy battleground
Putting aside the sad fact that Clinton and McCain seem to be on the same dumb side now with respect to the gas tax holiday, one does wonder if perhaps more media bigshots are reading more progressive blogs like EuroTrib (in particular, Jérôme's pieces) than they would rather be caught dead than admit to. A language is a dialect with an army and navy.
Otherwise, you have cases like Jerome's, where an issue and theme is hammered constantly for months or even years, and finally it begins to creep in as, through events, it becomes an easy sell to the press. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers. - George Carlin
Drew J Jones: Otherwise, you have cases like Jerome's, where an issue and theme is hammered constantly for months or even years, and finally it begins to creep in as, through events, it becomes an easy sell to the press.
I hear you. Still, see this comment: Friedman has arguably been at the leading edge of the media-blogosphere push to make green industry and renewable energy a central public policy issue in the U.S. A language is a dialect with an army and navy.
Sorry, that "green jobs" should have been "green economy", as the column I was thinking of did not specifically mention American jobs in the green sector:
As an American, I worry that if we don't start doing everything we can to develop our own clean power, we're going to miss out on the green industrial revolution. Today, most of our hybrid cars are imported from Japan. Tomorrow, if Mr. Shi has his way, most of our solar panels will come from China. For years our brain-dead Congress thought it was helping our power companies and manufacturers by not imposing tough energy-efficiency standards on them. In fact, it was just helping some of them commit suicide. Congress's idiotic decision not to impose higher mileage standards on U.S. carmakers helped Detroit miss the market and almost go bankrupt. China already has higher mileage standards for its autos than we do. China is setting high standards for renewables, but is still weak on enforcement. America is better at enforcement, but still weak on setting high standards. We need to get our act together, because eventually China will bring its enforcement in line with its regulations -- or it won't breathe. And when that happens, China's emerging green power entrepreneurs could clean our clock in the clean power business. Oh, well, you can always buy a share. Suntech is already listed on the New York Stock Exchange. China's Sunshine Boys (December 6, 2006)
For years our brain-dead Congress thought it was helping our power companies and manufacturers by not imposing tough energy-efficiency standards on them. In fact, it was just helping some of them commit suicide. Congress's idiotic decision not to impose higher mileage standards on U.S. carmakers helped Detroit miss the market and almost go bankrupt. China already has higher mileage standards for its autos than we do.
China is setting high standards for renewables, but is still weak on enforcement. America is better at enforcement, but still weak on setting high standards. We need to get our act together, because eventually China will bring its enforcement in line with its regulations -- or it won't breathe. And when that happens, China's emerging green power entrepreneurs could clean our clock in the clean power business.
Oh, well, you can always buy a share. Suntech is already listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
China's Sunshine Boys (December 6, 2006)
you are the media you consume.
(Obligatory disclosure: I'm a financier focusing on renewable energy...) In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
The McCain-Clinton proposal is a reminder to me that the biggest energy crisis we have in our country today is the energy to be serious -- the energy to do big things in a sustained, focused and intelligent way. We are in the midst of a national political brownout.
Jesus, is it too reckless to hope that this stuff is finally trickling out to the general public and really into people's heads?
(I just posted the article on my Facebook account. I am very curious to see if anyone responds to it.) A language is a dialect with an army and navy.
It was impossible for these idiots to see the huge bubbles in front of their noses a few years back, but now that we see actual underlying trends changing (moving away from oil), these are dismissed as unsusutainable (because that's what "bubble" means).
Wankers. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
