No More Renewable Energy Funding In The US ?
Posted by Big Gav
SolveClimate has a post on the bizarre efforts of the Republican party to kill what will probably be the largest source of new jobs in coming years - Senate Republicans Kill Renewable Energy and Job Creation Bill. Where's McCain?.
A Republican minority in the Senate today used procedural tricks to kill the Renewable Energy and Job Creation Act of 2008 -- a measure that had overwhelmingly passed the House of Representatives on May 21 by a vote of 263 to 160.
The law, among things, would have extended tax incentives crucial to existing green energy businesses, and secured 100,000 jobs now at risk. Sierra Club's Carl Pope called it "kicking the economy while it's down".
Ouch. John McCain should take note. Fellow Senate Republicans are undermining the credibility of his campaign speeches promising economic revitalization. Time for him to take a stand with some straight talk to his party's saboteurs?
Both Germany and Spain have shown the world what a long-term renewable energy policy can do for a national economy, and how to structure incentives. Both have model programs that start with a 20 year commitment to clean energy. The result?
Clean energy made at home, tens of thousands of green jobs, a booming new clean energy sector, international competitiveness.
The accompanying representational map shows the clean energy Marshall plan waiting for America to embrace. It comes from a presentation provided at a Senate briefing by Tom Mancini of Sandia National Laboratories. He's the Program Manager for Concentrated Solar Power (CSP). Sandia is prime contractor for the Department of Energy, a national security lab that's been working on CSP since 1975.
Have a look at his entire set of powerpoints slides housed on the website of the Environmental and Energy Study Institute, which organized the Senate briefing.
The main message? Renewable energy industries in the US are on the fast track, ready to deploy utility scale solutions. What's missing is a sustainable, long-term national policy to support the development of clean energy.
Like the ones Spain and Germany, the world leaders in clean energy, have adopted.
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