While driving home yesterday from a residential solar sun site survey, I was listening to a news report on the growing trade deficit in America. What you do not hear when the news media talks about the trade deficit is that 1/2 of this country’s trade deficit comes from energy imports. Why don’t you hear that number? It’s because big corporations control the message. I think the more people hear how solar and wind energy can start the economic engine and move us away from importing energy mostly from bad guys, the better off all of us would be.
Over the last 200 years mankind has learned to harness fossil fuels and a large scale powering the machines in this and other countries. Today we are now paying a price for this thirst for energy. The answer is return to the sun and capitalize on the immense power of solar and wind energy.
I don’t personally think environmentalist get it. It about the money stupid! Stop talking about climate change and start talking everywhere about how solar and renewable energy creates jobs in America! It’s that simple! If this country would take an aggressive step to implement solar on a residential level our economy would rocket up. Local jobs, local money poured into local businesses. Environmentalist talk about climate change as the reason we should pursue solar and other renewable energy, that in itself is reason enough, but keeping it at home is a better short term reason. Americans are instant gratification creatures.
Tea Party members want to take our country back? Then start shouting about going solar and help get us off foreign oil imports. Let’s stop exporting our national wealth!
That’s not reason enough to go solar? The how about an interesting little tid bit that has come out that shows jobs in solar and the green economy growing more than three times faster than jobs in total economy. Why don’t you see it on news? Corporate money. Big corporations cannot control the solar industry…yet and there are still millions to be made from oil.
The growth in the number of solar wind and renewable jobs in the “green” economy in California is outpacing the economy as a whole, despite lingering effects of the Great Recession, according to a report released Tuesday night by Next 10, an independent, nonpartisan organization focused on innovation and reported in the Valley Business Times. From January 2008 to 2009, the most recent full year for which data were available, solar jobs in the green sector grew more than three times faster (3 percent) than total employment in California (1 percent), the report says.
What it calls the “Core Green Economy” now accounts for 174,000 jobs in California and the rate of growth of green jobs has been similar to that of software jobs since 2005. For once, the Central Valley is not getting passed by. The report says that although slowing in the most recent year, San Joaquin Valley’s green economy expanded by 55 percent from January 1995 to 2009, producing nearly 3,360 jobs.
“The green job data is significant because these solar and wind energy jobs are growing in every region across the state, outpacing other sectors, and generating business across the supply chain,” says Noel Perry, founder of Next 10. “While green job numbers are modest relative to the overall economy, there are very few business sectors in a state as large as California that employ people across every region. The emergence of this vibrant ‘Core Green Economy’ can be attributed to California’s history of innovation, as well as our forward-looking energy and solar and wind energy efficiency policies.”
The solar and renewable energy employment report, says Next 10, offers a comprehensive, bottom-up accounting of California’s green economy, systematically tracking the most recent available data on employment, business establishments, location, and growth across every green sector and region of California.
Collaborative Economics of San Mateo, an economic research and consulting organization, prepared the report for Next 10. The energy generation sector is responsible for nearly 24 percent of green employment in the San Joaquin Valley.
Employment in solar and other renewable energy in this segment grew 113 percent (1,200 jobs) from 1995 to 2009, and establishments grew 175 percent (120 establishments). The largest segment of the Core Green Economy in the San Joaquin Valley region is recycling and waste, which accounts for 24 percent of green employment. Employment in this segment increased 4 percent from January 2008 to 2009 and was driven almost exclusively by job growth in recycling.
Other highlights include:
• The Bay Area and the Sacramento solar companies Area posted the strongest employment gains in the core green economy (which includes solar installation and manufacturing), expanding by 109 percent and 103 percent respectively since 1995, followed by Orange County (67 percent) and the San Joaquin Valley (55 percent).
• The Bay Area and the San Diego Region led in solar renewable and green job growth over the most recent observable year, expanding by eight percent and seven percent respectively (January 2008-2009).
• While manufacturing employment represents only 11 percent of statewide employment, it represents 26 percent of all solar wind and green employment. This sector increased 10 percent over the most recent observable period (January 2008-2009).
• Across all green segments, employment in the installation, sales, research and development, and finance and investment sectors more than doubled in California since 1995.
“Based on our research, California is well positioned to effectively leverage emerging opportunities and lead the expansion of solar and wind clean energy markets worldwide fixing our broken economies,” says Doug Henton, CEO of Collaborative Economics. “Considering that, by revenue, energy represents the largest industry in the world, California’s leadership in solar and renewable energy is a major factor in our future economic health.”