Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
cent more employment per dollar invested. That means we get more jobs and less poison
when we get electricity straight from the sun.
Where will the solar jobs come from in an economy that's going to be tough for at
least a few more years? Most of the growth will be in sales and distribution—34 per-
centyearoveryear.Installationemploymentnumbersareprojectedtogrow22percentin
2012 compared with 2011, while manufacturing will grow 14 percent. Can you imagine
any of those growth rates in almost any other economic sector?
We usually celebrate such steep growth with much fanfare, no matter how small the
startingpointmaybe.Butthat'snotalwaysthecasewhenitcomestosolar.TakeGeneral
Electric's solar plans. At around the same time that Solyndra went bust in late 2011, GE
announced planstobuyastartup solarmanufacturer andbuildafactory usingitstechno-
logy. The plant is going to be in Colorado and will employ about 400 people there, plus
another 100 or so who will support the solar business at GE's famous research campus
in Schenectady, New York. The factory will be bigger than 11 football fields and sup-
ply enough panels to power about 80,000 homes each year. GE expects to build similar
plants around the world as the industry grows.
Remember, GE is the company that generalized electricity, and it is pretty serious
aboutbeingabigpartofthesolareconomy.IusedtolovethechorusoftheMidnightOil
song “When the Generals Talk”:
When the generals talk
You better listen to him
When the generals talk
You better do what he say!
Well, this is GE's statement: “We are all in. We are going to invest what it takes …
because we know that by 2020 this is going to be at least a $1 billion product line.” This
wassaidbyGE'sJeffImmelt(whoalsohappenstoheadObama'sJobsCouncil).“Idon't
care about Solyndra or any of that other stuff; we did this with no government funding.
We can do this.”
Job Growth—but Only If We Demand It
There really is no question that the Solar Ascent will create lots of jobs. The only ques-
tionis,
Will mainstream America benefit from them?
Weknowthatthepeoplewantthem:
for four consecutive years, nine out of 10 Americans have said they “think it is import-
ant” for the United States to develop and use solar energy.
Perhaps a more concrete proof point was the hardball campaign that led to the
