Union leader: Earth Day is also about jobs, and a PTC extension

on April 23, 2012 | 5 min read

Earth Day was yesterday, and union leader Vickie L. Hurley penned an op-ed in the Roanoke Times, taking note of the day and how wind power, which benefits the environment by displacing polluting energy sources, can also provide new manufacturing jobs in Virginia and elsewhere.

Ms. Hurley, president of IUE-CWA Local 82161 in Salem, Va., called for an extension of the federal wind energy Production Tax Credit (PTC), an incentive which has proven extremely effective in helping wind power expand, leading in turn to more jobs and factories in the burgeoning industry's supply chain.

Commented Ms. Hurley, “[W]ind energy employs workers right here in Salem. Harnessing wind can create and secure high-quality construction and manufacturing jobs, like those in the General Electric plant in Salem where I work. At our facility, we make control systems for a variety of GE Energy products, including controls designed for wind turbines. In January, GE announced an additional 60 positions — adding to approximately 700 working men and women already on our payroll. The company attributed that job growth in part to increased demand for wind turbine controls. And these are good union jobs, with decent wages and benefits.”

She concluded, “We should … push Congress to help the wind industry by extending these critical tax credits — for the sake of the planet but also for the sake of manufacturing workers in our hometown and all across the country.”

The PTC provides an income tax credit of 2.2 cents per kilowatt-hour for the first 10 years of electricity production from utility-scale turbines. It is set to expire on Dec. 31.

A House bill seeking to extend the PTC has 93 cosponsors, including 21 Republicans, while a Senate bill to extend it was introduced March 15 by seven Senators, including three Republicans. PTC extension efforts have received the endorsement of a broad coalition of more than 370 members, including the National Association of Manufacturers, the American Farm Bureau Federation, the Edison Electric Institute, and the Western Governors’ Association. A PTC extension also has the support of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Governors Association, and the bipartisan Governors’ Wind Energy Coalition, which includes 23 Republican and Democratic Governors from across the U.S. A PTC extension has been endorsed by a number of newspapers across the country, including the Houston Chronicle, The New York Times, the Denver Post, and the Daily Oklahoman.

Further endorsements of the wind energy production tax credit.

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