Study: County appears ripe for renewal with green energy
northcoastNOW
Lorain County’s manufacturing past elevated it to the No. 2 spot on a list of counties with the most potential to benefit from a push for renewable energy technology.
Only Cuyahoga County ranked above it in a report by the Renewable Energy Policy Project that was released Wednesday.
Susan Knight, national field coordinator for the Blue Green Alliance — a partnership of the Sierra Club and the United Auto Workers that worked on the report — said Lorain County’s high ranking was the result of it having the right resources in the right place.
The county’s existing facilities gave it a big boost up the list — ranking it above the counties where Cincinnati, Akron and Columbus are.
“It comes down to existing manufacturing,” Knight said. “Nobody wants to build infrastructure.”
The report, “Ohio’s Road to Energy Independence,” found that more than 1,500 jobs and more than $240 million worth of investment in the industry could be generated if renewable energy component makers set up shop locally.
Overall, counties across the state could land as many as 22,922 new jobs, including 13,215 jobs in wind turbine manufacturing and 5,957 jobs in solar manufacturing, the report said.
“Ohio has what it takes to lead the way in alternative energy production,” said U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, during a conference call Wednesday. “… It’s insane in this country that we do so much (research and development), but the components are built elsewhere.”
Brown pointed to the construction of Oberlin College’s Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies. Its builders were forced to look to Germany and Japan for the solar panels needed for the job.
With the state’s skilled manufacturing work force and its excellent transportation infrastructure, he said, Ohio could be producing wind turbine and solar panel components right at home.
“We are exactly in the right place,” Brown said.
Dave Foster, executive director for the Blue Green Alliance, said a renewable energy standard at the federal and state level needs to pass before a critical demand for jobs becomes a reality.
Renewable energy manufacturing, the report indicates, can revitalize communities that have lost jobs, as well as creating a whole new generation of good-paying manufacturing jobs.
Frank DeTillio, president of the county’s Chamber of Commerce, said he wasn’t surprised to hear that the county ranked as high as it did.
“I think the study evaluated the fact that our workforce already has the skill set and ongoing operations to add new opportunities to existing businesses,” he said. “All of our history and our economy have been based on making things.”
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Contact Stephen Szucs at 329-7129 or sszucs@chroniclet.com.
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Filed by northcoastNOW January 24th, 2008 in Top Stories.
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While I appreciate all the efforts to bring high technology and green energy to this area, the whole emphasis has been on businesses and college research. Then when it is all done then we locals can use a billed service or acquire a job. You still need to sell the hope of the technologies to us. Explain what the technologies are, how we will benefit short term and long term. Back in the 60’s and 70’s this green energy was all a grassroots, counter culture thing, laughed at by industry and frowned on by government as rebelling the system and illegal in some cases. Now all of a sudden it is the darling of sustainability and survival and potential money maker. Just remember the innovations in hot rodding and personal computing began in somebody’s garage. The public deserves more than just being a market, a customer or a worker. The need to develop a culture to support the technologies is here also.
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