Radio Address: Renewable Energy Economy Taking Root in Michigan
This week’s radio address highlights how the renewable energy sector is creating new jobs in our state, and how President Obama’s plan to build a renewable energy economy will offer us even more opportunities in the future.
Hello, this is Governor Jennifer Granholm.
This week, President Obama’s director of recovery for auto communities and workers came back to Michigan to hear about the economic turmoil we are experiencing from job losses and to discuss solutions. He expressed the federal government’s commitment to helping us move through these tough times.
On Monday, U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis will be here talking about a sector where jobs are growing. Solis will join Van Jones, the president’s green jobs adviser, at Michigan’s first-ever Green Today, Jobs Tomorrow conference.
The president’s plan to build a clean, renewable energy economy that will create jobs and break America’s dependence on foreign oil presents enormous opportunities for Michigan. In fact, our green economy is already taking root. According to a report being released Monday that was commissioned by the Michigan Department of Energy, Labor and Economic Growth, Michigan businesses have already created at least 109,000 private sector green jobs. Michigan’s green companies have expanded their employment by 7.7 percent. Companies that produce renewable energy have grown by 30 percent.
Those numbers are impressive, but it’s really the people behind the numbers who matter. It’s the laid-off autoworker who gets a job manufacturing wind turbine parts at a retooled auto plant. It’s the unemployed construction worker who can pay the mortgage again because he’s helping to build a biomass facility. It’s the engineer who was in danger of becoming obsolete but is now developing advanced batteries. It’s the kid right out of community college who can start off installing solar panels and work his way up to owning the company.
The green economy is all this, and more. To help keep that job creation and business growth going, we have to make sure we have the most valuable natural resource of all: a highly educated work force.
And that’s why we’ve established the Green Jobs Initiative, which uses $6 million in federal funds to prepare Michigan workers for all kinds of green jobs. About $1.5 million of that will help develop training programs for specific industries, such as wind and solar, while another $1.5 million will help community colleges, universities and other facilities expand their training capacities for green jobs. And about $3 million will enable the highly successful No Worker Left Behind program to provide green-jobs training for more unemployed or underemployed citizens.
Back-to-back visits from national leaders focusing on the changing auto industry and green jobs seem fitting, because using our manufacturing strengths to diversify our economy through alternative energy will help us overcome the loss of auto jobs. More than that, though, they are two chapters in the same book. That book is the story of Michigan: a story of resilience and renewal.
Thank you for listening.
On Thursday, Governor Granholm toured Cascade Engineering with President Obama’s Auto Recovery Director Dr. Ed Montgomery. Cascade Engineering is an auto parts manufacturer that has also diversified their product line to making components for the renewable energy field. WOOD TV8 in Grand Rapids spoke with the Governor about the tour, and the issues she would be addressing with Dr. Montgomery while he was visiting the state.
Also this week, Governor Granholm attended the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) conference in Chicago to meet with leaders in the industry and tell them about the potential that exists in our state.
The governor joined a panel of Midwestern governors this morning. Her schedule included private meetings with ten of the world’s most prominent wind-energy companies. Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC) President and CEO Greg Main and members of the MEDC team joined her at the conference to court new employers and help raise Michigan’s national profile in the wind-energy industry.
Michigan is recognized in AWEA’s 2009 ranking as the nation’s second fastest-growing state for new wind capacity. In addition, the U.S. Department of Energy rates Michigan as the fourth-best place in America for the production of wind energy and the manufacture of wind turbines.
The conference in Chicago is the largest of its kind in the world. To read more about the event, check out their website here.
