I have repeatedly harped on the fact that renewable energy should be an “American” thing. I think we have the perfect setup to really dominate this industry. One of the many benefits to this strategy of renewable energy domination is the creation of lots of high paying high tech jobs. Seems that other people are starting to say the same thing.

The state of Arizona recently released a 128 page report outlining all the sweet things renewable energy would do for their state. Here is a snippet from the Business Journal of Phoenix

The state could create more 3,000 jobs and significantly reduce emissions if the public and private sector adopt new solar energy technologies, according to the Solar Roadmap Study released Friday by the Arizona Department of Commerce.

The 128-page report projects that up to 1,000 megawatts of solar energy could be implemented in Arizona by 2020, creating thousands of jobs and reducing airborne emissions by 400,000 tons a year.
“Developing these technologies will provide substantial economic benefit for Arizona while reducing air pollutant emissions, creating jobs, and redirecting the amount of money that flows out of state for energy,” said Gov. Janet Napolitano. “I’ve long said Arizona is the ‘Saudi Arabia of solar energy’ within the United States, yet the vast solar resource of the state and its economic potential remain largely untapped.”

More than $6 billion of the $10 billion plus that Arizonans annually spend on energy exits the state, leading business and political leaders to push for more sustainable energy sources here.

“New approaches to energy efficiency and the development of the state’s clean energy resources will create good, high-wage jobs for Arizonans,” said Arizona Department of Commerce Director Jan Lesher.

Other findings in the study include:

• Technology improvements/cost reductions will allow central solar to compete with conventional baseload and intermediate generation.
• As of June 2006, nine states have renewable portfolio standard (RPS) bills introduced and three are considering increasing RPS targets, including the Arizona target.
• Arizona renewable energy funds in 2006 were expected to provide approximately $13.5 million, climbing to more than $50 million a year upon implementation of the Renewable Energy Standard and Tariff (REST).
• The National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimates the technical potential for concentrating solar power at 2.5 gigawatts in Arizona — almost three times the potential of California.

For more: www.azcommerce.com.

3000 new jobs, way less pollution (and carbon emissions) and keeping billions of dollars in the state economy. And this is just Arizona and solar, other states could do the same with solar, wind, or wave.

And while we talk about how many jobs these technologies could produce Canada is doing something about it.

From here

The federal Conservative government is to announce today a subsidy for electricity generated by wind, solar and other forms of renewable energy.

The aid – called the EcoEnergy Renewable Power Initiative – will amount to less than a similar Liberal plan the Conservatives scrapped nearly a year ago, the Toronto Star has learned.

On Sunday, sources say, the federal government will unveil a revised version of the program that paid part of the cost when homeowners make their house more energy efficient.

Today’s announcement on renewable energy is to be made in British Columbia by Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn.

The program will pay 1 cent per kilowatt-hour for electricity from large-scale renewable sources. A kilowatt-hour is enough to run ten 100-watt light bulbs for an hour.

The subsidy will be available for generation that goes into operation during the next four years.

The government is budgeting $300 million for that period – enough to support projects with a total generating capacity of 4,000 megawatts.
However, once projects are approved, they’ll continue to receive aid for 10 years. So the total cost is estimated at $1.5 billion.

Less than 1 per cent of Canada’s electricity supply now comes from renewable energy. Once the 4,000 megawatts of new capacity is up and running, that will increase to about 5 per cent.

In its 2005 budget, the then-Liberal government launched two similar programs – one for wind power and the other for the remaining renewable sources.

Combined, they offered roughly the same initial amount of $300 million. But it was to cover up to 5,500 megawatts in capacity over five years.

In that plan, the total cost would have been $1.8 billion – or $300 million more than the Conservatives’ commitment.

So Canada is spending enough money to create 4000 megawatts, if we use Arizona’s estimate of 3000 jobs for 1000 megawatts we can assume that Canada will be creating 12,000 jobs or more. And just if you think Canada might be wasting its 1.5 billion (Canadian) dollars, try looking at what kind of money we spend each MONTH on the Iraq war and you will quickly see that they are getting a big bang for their buck.