The $30 billion jobs opportunity

In an election year, you cannot swing a dead cat without hitting a political ad, photo op, or campaigning politician. In a country still reeling in many ways from the economic collapse of six years ago, the largest talking point still centers around job growth. Regardless of one's opinion on how many jobs we really need as we develop more and more efficient ways to maintain our quality of life, the current state of affairs in Illinois comes down to 433,000 people who want and need to work who cannot find a job. With approximately 150,000 to 200,000 job openings in Illinois going unfulfilled, we would need to create about 250,000 new jobs in order to obtain full employment. With manufacturing making a slow recovery, and nowhere near fast enough to create that kind of growth, where can we turn for good paying, productive jobs?

Clean energy and energy efficiency.

Currently, Illinois' residential and small business consumers spend over $30 billion a year for energy. Almost all of that capital leaves the state, with only a small portion getting recycled back into the Illinois economy. If we can find a way to tap into that capital already being spent, and turn that into job growth, we can both improve our employment situation and create a cleaner, healthier future. In addition, that $30 billion, at current rates of escalation, can be $35-40 billion within only a year or two, so economically, it behooves us to move quickly.

The key to the job growth comes from the need for almost all energy efficiency and clean energy work to use local labor. The fixing up of homes and small commercial buildings, installation of solar panels, and construction of wind turbines uses, almost exclusively, local labor. Dirty energy industries, including nuclear, employ somewhere between 5 and 8 people for every $1 million spent. Clean energy and energy efficiency employ about 16 to 17 in good, median income-scale jobs. That means that our $30 billion each year could fund as many as 495,000 jobs in Illinois. Even if we only took half of our current energy expenditures and switched them to clean energy or energy efficiency, we would more than eliminate our current unemployment. In addition, we would build a stronger, more resilient economy less susceptible to shocks from energy price increases.

It will take much work in our financial sector to develop the mechanisms to make this change happen, but it can happen within months, not years. We have the capacity to train workers through our robust community college network. We have the knowhow through years of programs managed by local consultants and non-profits. All it takes is for the financial system to let small building owners tap into the same tools to which institutions and large customers already have access. Tools like on-bill financing, property-assessed clean energy, and community energy cooperatives provide the mechanism that can turn $30 billion a year in energy expenditures into a $500 billion construction program.

It will also take political will...to bring big energy companies and utilities to the table when any program like this is in the interest of the consumer but not large energy companies. It will be interesting to see if either candidate for Governor has the insight or will to make something like this happen.

Friday Five: May 16, 2014

Locally, we have heard much about a proposed "super-agency" that would handle public transit issues across the entire Chicago metro region. The article notes a prime reason why that would make sense: suburban and urban communities have differing value systems related to transit, often resulting in bad decisions.
Cities to suburbs: Where's the transit love? Suburbs to cities: Where's the bus?
"Like a lot of other cities in this country, Seattle’s public transportation story is a sad tale of post-recession budget shortfalls, outdated urban planning, and a not-so-efficient bus system with a PR problem. And like a lot of other cities, its problems run deeper than just figuring out how to keep the buses running."

We continue to pay for two generations worth of those bad decisions. The concentration of emissions represented by freeways creates pollution issues that extend beyond the vehicles traveling along the route. These areas typically house those of more limited means, increasing the social inequity associated with fossil fuel usage.
Air quality monitor near I-5 Anaheim finds higher pollution level
"Monitoring instruments have typically been placed away from major roads and pollution sources because they are intended to gauge regional air quality. Now, the EPA is ordering local regulators to measure and factor in the dirtier air being breathed by tens of millions of people across the country who live within a few hundred feet of a major road.
The data will be valuable to local planning officials, who must consider the environmental impacts of siting developments near traffic, and give more leverage to clean air advocates."

An increasingly disturbing trend is that those who can least afford to drive their own vehicle, must now do so because of the push to gentrify urban areas and displace local inhabitants instead of building with them. As the poor get forced to suburbs with less availability for public transit, this will only get worse.
The demographic paradox of who bikes and walks to work
"The report, based on some of the ACS questions that critics want the Census to drop, identifies some other expected patterns: The South has particularly miniscule numbers for both biking and walking to work (likely a product of both climate and sprawl). Men are more likely to bike to work than women. And those who do bike tend to leave for work later than other commuters, and they need less time to get there (19.3 minutes on average, compared with the typical 26-minute commute for most of the rest of us)."

Thankfully, in addition to requiring the monitoring of roadways, the EPA has received legal reinforcement of its plans to regulate emissions as a path to improving public health. There is hope that sanity may yet prevail.
Another big EPA court victory - this time on soot pollution
"The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled that the EPA acted properly in 2012 when it further restricted allowable soot emissions. It was the Obama administration’s third big environmental legal victory in a month. And experts say that bodes well for the administration’s efforts to clamp down on climate-changing emissions from power plants."

I find it heartening that although embroiled in a bitter re-election campaign, the governor of Illinois continues to move on greening and local food movements, even drawing attention to the issues through the governor's mansion.
Chickens winging it at Illinois governor's mansion
"The chickens, which peck at flowers, recycle plant waste and provide manure for the gardens, live in a donated coop that's inside a fenced-in enclosure. The poultry's part of an ongoing sustainability effort."

Happy Friday!