# Someone Explain 'Green Jobs', Please. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 8, 2009, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241 "2009-09-08T02:37:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/21 "2009-09-08T19:23:07Z")
“Short term” is precisely the apt phrase. Sooner or later, we gotta stop burning carbon fuels, and we don’t know how yet. Which bet would you rather make? We figure another way out, or we die? ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/22 "2009-09-08T19:59:17Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > There is no way in hell solar and wind power generators are cheaper than coal or we would be tripping over ourselves to build them. At best solar is a niche market limited to western arid states where solar/thermal shows promise. Wind generators are a maintenance joke. The newer design concepts that uses staged windings in place of complex transmissions shows promise but they are still not cheap to build, they are very limited by location and are an obnoxious thing to live next to. Geothermal is not even on the map. The best use of geothermal technology is at the micro-level where ground water is used to leverage the efficiency of heating/cooling systems. That is probably the only real technology that returns a savings. > > Coal is by far the best short term solution to our energy needs. Any attempt to penalize it will burn the economy down and reduce funding for future technological upgrades. We are tripping over ourselves to build them, that is why wind energy grows at 20%+ a year. In the US wind capacity went up 60% in 2008. Solar is expected to do the same soon, growing exponentially as it becomes a cheaper alternative to coal or natural gas. Wind energy used to make up less than 1% of energy a few years ago. Now some states like Iowa get 10% of energy from wind, and the US could have 10-20% of its grid energy from wind by the 2020s. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/23 "2009-09-08T20:23:27Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > We are tripping over ourselves to build them, that is why wind energy grows at 20%+ a year. In the US wind capacity went up 60% in 2008. Solar is expected to do the same soon, growing exponentially as it becomes a cheaper alternative to coal or natural gas. It is growing fast; it’s not growing exponentially. And it will top out at a relatively low level compared to the entire US grid demand. Even if a huge amount of wind potential capacity goes online, there is of course the issue of capacity factor. And then there’s the issue of frequency stabilization with baseload generation. I’m not going to repeat myself on these issues. As of the 12 months ending May 2009, ALL non-hydro renewables only accounted for 3.2% of US electrical generation (cite: [http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/table1\_1.html](http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/table1_1.html)) This is not much different than the 2.2% in 1995. Edited: fucking computer, I’ll need to post more in a second post. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/24 "2009-09-08T20:28:34Z")
My second post, now that my computer is working, is that I’m 110% in favor of wind, and I hope it keeps growing. Ten percent of total generation is probably, and 20% very possible IMO. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/25 "2009-09-08T20:43:09Z")
There are lots of alternate forms of energy power. They should all be used as much as possible. Will they supplant oil and coal? For sure not in the near future, but we should push them as hard as possible. Who knows what the future holds ? ---
**Author:** ![Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e480ec/32.png) [@Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Least_Original_User_Name_Ever)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/26 "2009-09-08T20:47:10Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > There is no way in hell solar and wind power generators are cheaper than coal or we would be tripping over ourselves to build them. At best solar is a niche market limited to western arid states where solar/thermal shows promise. Wind generators are a maintenance joke. The newer design concepts that uses staged windings in place of complex transmissions shows promise but they are still not cheap to build, they are very limited by location and are an obnoxious thing to live next to. Geothermal is not even on the map. The best use of geothermal technology is at the micro-level where ground water is used to leverage the efficiency of heating/cooling systems. That is probably the only real technology that returns a savings. > > Coal is by far the best short term solution to our energy needs. Any attempt to penalize it will burn the economy down and reduce funding for future technological upgrades. I think only the truly deluded will say that “(insert alternative energy of choice) will power the world”, at least as the technology is as it is now. It’s going to be a pantheon of these energies and a Smart Grid that’s going to get us the most bang for our buck. Yes, we’ve got a lot of coal, but it’s not renewable or clean. It’s performed admirably for our nation through, but it’s time for the next thing in the very near future. ---
**Author:** ![Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e480ec/32.png) [@Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Least_Original_User_Name_Ever)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/27 "2009-09-08T20:49:08Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > My second post, now that my computer is working, is that I’m 110% in favor of wind, and I hope it keeps growing. Ten percent of total generation is probably, and 20% very possible IMO. 10% of Germany’s power comes from solar. I don’t see why we can’t get that at least. That coupled with 10 or 20% from wind, some from tidal, and the picture starts to get clearer. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2009, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/28 "2009-09-08T21:38:14Z")
> [@Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](#): > > 10% of Germany’s power comes from solar. I don’t see why we can’t get that at least. That coupled with 10 or 20% from wind, some from tidal, and the picture starts to get clearer. Out of curiosity, where are you getting those numbers from? They are incorrect, I fear. (And what is it about Germany on this message board? A while back I had to debunk a “Germany gets unrealistic X% of power from wind” meme in GQ.) From: [http://www.worldwatch.org/node/5449](http://www.worldwatch.org/node/5449) > [@](#): > > Germany remains the world’s top PV installer, accounting for almost half of the global market in 2007 Thanks to the country’s feed-in tariff for renewable electricity, which requires utilities to pay customers a guaranteed rate for any renewable power they feed into the grid, Germans installed about 1,300 megawatts of new PV capacity, up from 850 megawatts in 2006, for a total exceeding 3,830 megawatts. As capacity has risen, PV installed system costs have been cut in half in Germany between 1997 and 2007. **PVs now meet about 1 percent of Germany’s electricity demand** , a share that some analysts expect could reach 25 percent by 2050 From: [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/04/AR2007050402466.html](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/04/AR2007050402466.html) > [@](#): > > For now, the technology remains expensive and barely registers as a fraction of total energy production – **less than 0.5 percent.** The government hopes to increase that figure to 3 percent by 2020. From: [http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/16/business/worldbusiness/16solar.html](http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/16/business/worldbusiness/16solar.html) > [@](#): > > The amount of electricity generated by these installations rose 60 percent in 2007 compared with 2006, faster than any other renewable energy (solar still generates **just 0.6 percent** of Germany’s total electricity, compared with **6.4 percent for wind** ). ---
**Author:** ![Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e480ec/32.png) [@Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Least_Original_User_Name_Ever)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/29 "2009-09-09T01:55:09Z")
Good question, and I can’t find the cite. However, I’ll happily retract it. Stuff I’m looking up falls more in line with what you said. Upon review, I may have conflated the amount of solar stuff that Germany buys with the amount of power it generates. Also, why Germany? It invests a lot in solar technology and everyone knows that Germany isn’t the sunniest place in the universe. If solar is viable in Germany, it’s viable in the States. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/30 "2009-09-09T02:05:19Z")
Germany manufactures half the world solar panels. They have 15 plants producing them. Those are green jobs because the plants are totally green. Part of the manufacturing process is improving line techniques and improving the product. They will get better and better. They will be made faster and cheaper. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/31 "2009-09-09T02:46:36Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Germany manufactures half the world solar panels. They have 15 plants producing them. Those are green jobs because the plants are totally green. Part of the manufacturing process is improving line techniques and improving the product. They will get better and better. They will be made faster and cheaper. I don’t see conventional solar cells ever being really useful on a cost/kwh basis. There are a number of thin film systems in production that may brighten our day. You can buy panels that replace shingles, which is the right direction to move toward. it’s expensive (stupid) to constantly replace both shingles and solar panels. Personally, I would rather invest in coal in the short term and refine bio-algae diesel to a practical point so we can marry the 2 together (co2 from coal plants are used to feed the algae). Dollar for dollar, I see it as the most practical short-term technology for removing large amounts of Co2. All the necessary infrastructure is in place to make it happen so it’s really just a matter of bridging the gap on the cost of oil refinement. The next best investment in energy production/conservation technology is the use of geothermal heat pumps in place of traditional air conditioning/heating units. The savings are substantial which would translate directly into relief for the power grid. The technology itself is mature and just needs a mainstream nudge to lower the cost of installation. If you can lower the trenching costs or drilling costs for a closed loop system then traditional systems will disappear. If we just focused on these 2 technologies on a national level we would be energy independent and the money flowing out of the country would be remain internally and that would have a huge affect on tax revenue. More money in the banks would result in lower interest rates, which would result in more business loans. On the same vein of thought. When I see money spent on hybrids I have to ask if it’s the best return on investment. Currently, a hybrid car is roughly comparable to a diesel in fuel economy yet has a smaller consumer base because it lacks the power of a diesel car and it costs more. It’s all about dollar value. The more people you can put behind efficient automobiles the greater the achieved objective. We need the most practical, cost-effective solutions to clean power. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/32 "2009-09-09T02:53:00Z")
For the record, I know what a ‘green job’ is. I kind of work in one myself. Wind is a pretty good technology for niche areas. Solar too. Both together will be lucky to make up more than 20% of our total power needs for the foreseeable future (i.e. the next 30-50 years). But what I’m unclear on is exactly what people expect from a ‘green jobs czar’, or how a ‘green economy’ is somehow supposed to be a savior of the U.S. and allow the country to become more environmentally friendly while at the same time creating jobs and GDP growth. Because it seems to me that if there was profit to be made here, people would be investing in it without the help of a Czar. The most baffling part of this to me is the notion that somehow a ‘green economy’ is going to be even better than the old one from an economic standpoint, and how it will be a net creator of jobs. Because the way I see it, the only way to stimulate more alternative energy is to either pay for it with government money, or provide government tax credits so people will invest in it, or tax and regulate other forms of energy to make ‘green’ jobs spring up and shift the balance towards alternative energy. None of these strategies improve the economy. All of them have the net effect of raising your energy costs. If you want to argue that saving the earth is worth the cost, fine. That’s a reasonable argument. But it seems to me that the argument goes something like this: - provide ‘incentives’ to build green technologies. - tax and regulate other forms of energy. - ??? - PROFIT! It’s that last step that confuses me. I know the boilerplate - invest now, drive costs down, learn how to do the technology, become a world leader, then everyone beats a path to your door. The thing is, that’s a dream, and not a strategy. I could say the same thing about ‘internet jobs’, or ‘robotics jobs’, or ‘auto jobs’. The experience we have with governments trying to kick-start industries is dismal. The Japanese 5th generation project blew through billions and never produced a product, then got upstaged by a 20 person company in Silicon Valley. Government ‘partnerships’ in semiconductors were a giant waste of money. And more on point, the first attempt at building ‘green jobs’ has already been done, and it was a colossal failure. Billions have been thrown at ethanol production in the U.S., and billions more have been sucked out of the economy in the form of tariffs and taxes. The result has been an environmental disaster, an economic disaster, and ultimately, a failure. I guess I’m assuming that if we’re at the point where officials are being appointed to manage the program, someone must have some concrete plans to work from. Can anyone outline something similar to say, NASA’s long-term vision for space exploration? Maybe a timeline showing what investments are going to be made, and for what purpose, and what is hoped to be accomplished with them? With perhaps even some ballpark numbers as to how this might turn a profit and lead to job creation? ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/33 "2009-09-09T03:05:23Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > I’m trying to figure out how this makes more sense than announcing an ‘internet jobs’ economy. After all, we all know theoretically how you can make money from the internet. > > However, what goes unstated is that somehow there is a big need for such jobs going unfilled right now, and why the government feels that it can somehow create this industry and make it profitable, AND turn it into a uniquely American form of jobs. Curiously enough, it was a couple of American development programs (Minuteman II guidance system development and the Semi-Automatic Ground Environment) which gave birth to the modern computer industry and uniquely positioned the United States to be dominant in it from the 1960s onward, despite the fact that several nations were theoretically more advanced in the application of discrete mathematics and computing technology. Planning for the same thing in the renewable and recoverable energy industries is hardly a pipe dream. As for why the free market isn’t already exploiting it, the fact is that it is; it is one of the most popular areas for venture investment and technology development. However, a stimulus in the form of both research and application support may give the US a considerable edge, just as it enjoyed such an edge from government investment in shipbuilding, rocketry, medicine, and other fields. Whether the proposal advanced by the Obama Administration is worthwhile or just fuzzy belly rubbing I do not know, as I haven’t researched it, but a targeted investment in both research and stimulating applied industry may render a large yield for the population of the United States as a whole and a worthwhile expenditure of tax revenue. As an aside, I find the way the o.p. is stated to be disingenuous and intellectually offensive. Instead of either explicitly stating a position to be defended or asking for honest debate, it insincerely presents a question in passive-aggressive form accompanied by innuendo and semantic baiting. Surely the o.p. can do better than this. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/34 "2009-09-09T03:18:30Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > on a more serious note. Click search inside [this book](http://www.amazon.com/Green-Collar-Economy-Solution-Problems/dp/0061650757) You HAVE to be kidding. All you can read from ‘search inside this book’ is a diatribe about Katrina, the Iraq War, and the gap between rich and poor. That’s it. Of course, the author is Van Jones, who I should listen to because…why? The guy has a law degree from Yale (which he picked over Harvard because “it didn’t have grades, so I could spend four years being an activist and still graduate”). Why is a lawyer suited to writing a book on a subject that is really about engineering, business, and economics? If the rest of the content of the book is as substantive as that first chapter, it’s not worth the paper it’s printed on, other than to punch the buttons of fellow travelers. I love the reviewers of the book on the back cover: Tom Daschle, Arianna Huffington, Nancy Pelosi, and Tom Friedman. Who knew they were experts in energy economics and power engineering? But we know it’s a viable economic plan, because “Tavis Smiley, television and radio host” tells us so. Now, how about pointing me to a book by someone who actually understands the issues involved? Actually, I found some material myself - I just spent half an hour on the “Green For All” web site. I understand now. This isn’t a path to a newer, better economy. It’s a jobs program. It’s government borrowing or taxing a lot of money, and using it to hire people to do well-paying ‘green collar’ jobs - mostly people from the poor and minority communities. It’s a wealth transfer system masquerading as an economic plan for the future. In some ways, that’s not a bad thing. If you’re going to give money to the poor and to minorities, you might as well use it to train them in some skills that might be marketable. Just don’t market it as something which will actually improve the economy and lead to higher economic growth and all that. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/35 "2009-09-09T03:31:57Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > For the record, I know what a ‘green job’ is. Oh. Well in that case, why did you initially pretend that you didn’t? > [@Sam Stone's OP](#): > > What does a ‘Green Job’ even look like? […] > I’d like some detail, please. Maybe an example of a ‘green job’? > [@Sam Stone](#): > > Because it seems to me that if there was profit to be made here, people would be investing in it without the help of a Czar. Well, people **are** investing in it, as, for instance, **Wesley** ’s and **Una** ’s posts and cites made clear. The “green jobs” approach simply favors some government-funded pump-priming to get **more** investment in it. AFAICT, the reasons for dissatisfaction with current levels of private investment in “green economy” areas are twofold: 1. In case you haven’t noticed, there’s a bit of an economic slump on now, and investment in general is on the sluggish side. So the government is scoping out places to put some Keynesian deficit spending in order to stimulate the economy. 2. There is growing concern about significant negative externalities from anthropogenic climate change through greenhouse gas emissions, which are not likely to be internalized within market transactions soon enough to minimize their environmental impact. So the government is looking for ways to nudge markets towards lower-carbon activities, via “green investment”, tax incentives, etc. etc. In short, the basic arguments for “green economy” seem to be a combination of seeking environmental benefits, cutting costs through conservation and reuse/recycling, and supporting research and infrastructure development for greater environmental sustainability. If you want fuller details, why don’t you try reading some of the cites that various posters have linked for you, and come back to debate specific points and assertions concerning them? > [@Sam Stone](#): > > None of these strategies improve the economy. All of them have the net effect of raising your energy costs. I don’t see how you can say that unless you’re completely overlooking the “energy efficiency” aspect of the “green jobs” approach. Clearly, reducing energy use reduces energy costs. (That’s not to claim that some versions of a “green economy” might not involve a **net** increase in energy costs overall, just pointing out that it’s not true that **all** “green-jobs” strategies raise energy costs.) > [@Sam Stone](#): > > And more on point, the first attempt at building ‘green jobs’ has already been done, and it was a colossal failure. Billions have been thrown at ethanol production in the U.S., and billions more have been sucked out of the economy in the form of tariffs and taxes. The result has been an environmental disaster, an economic disaster, and ultimately, a failure. You seem to be arguing that the occurrence of a failure means that nothing of the sort should ever be attempted, and I’m not sure that reasoning holds water. For example, the housing market experienced quite a colossal failure recently, but nobody’s suggesting that we should just stop investing in housing. I think your own ideological views make you inclined to a certain degree of confirmation bias in which markets can do no wrong and governments can do no right. > [@Sam Stone](#): > > guess I’m assuming that if we’re at the point where officials are being appointed to manage the program, someone must have some concrete plans to work from. Can anyone outline something similar to say, NASA’s long-term vision for space exploration? They can, they have, and they have linked you to various reports on various versions of that long-term vision, which you have apparently seen fit to ignore. Are you actually going to bother reading any of the [cites](http://apolloalliance.org/reports/) that people go to the trouble of looking up for you? Or are you just going to go on making faux-naive requests for elementary information? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/36 "2009-09-09T03:32:46Z")
Well, **Sam** , not everybody is as open-minded and progressive as you are. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/37 "2009-09-09T03:41:31Z")
> [@Stranger on a Train](#): > > Surely the o.p. can do better than this. I agree it would be nice. > [@Sam Stone](#): > > If you’re going to give money to the poor and to minorities, you might as well use it to train them in some skills that might be marketable. Just don’t market it as something which will actually improve the economy and lead to higher economic growth and all that. In the first place, if “green-collar job” skills are marketable, that would seem to be a point in favor of green-collar jobs. In the second place, how do you figure that training poor people in well-paying jobs with marketable skills doesn’t count as “actually improving the economy”? If we have reduced poverty, reduced economic inequality, and more formerly poor people holding down good jobs, that sounds like some substantial improvements to me. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/38 "2009-09-09T08:17:23Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > Curiously enough, it was a couple of American development programs (Minuteman II guidance system development and the Semi-Automatic Ground Environment) which gave birth to the modern computer industry and uniquely positioned the United States to be dominant in it from the 1960s onward, despite the fact that several nations were theoretically more advanced in the application of discrete mathematics and computing technology. This would be called ‘serendipity’. All technologies produce serendipitous results to some degree. Someone invents a plastic to solve a problem with manfacturing forms, and it turns out to make great skis. A guy makes the first web browser thinking that it will be used for universities to post research papers and such, and it winds up making a an auction system and providing porn to millions. Henry Ford makes the model T, and kicks off everything from drive-in restaraunts and movie houses to the new concept called a ‘teenager’. Stuff happens. > [@](#): > > Planning for the same thing in the renewable and recoverable energy industries is hardly a pipe dream. Serendipity cannot be planned. At best, you can use a shotgun, spraying technology all over the place hoping some of it sticks somewhere you never thought of. Now, I’m not saying that no good can possibly come of this. I’ll even give you a better example than the Minuteman missile - the global GPS system. Centrally planned, it has saved the world far more money than it cost to design and implement. So such things are possible. I’d just like to see an actual plan. I spent another good part of the evening reading up on more material, including all the cites given, and the best conclusion that I can come up with is that this is 21st century workfare on a huge scale. Most of the cites make no bones about it - they justify the programs in terms of how many minorities and poor people it will employ. And rather than justify it on cost savings, they justify it by saying that the wages paid will be guaranteed to be good, middle class incomes. The people coming up with the plans I’ve seen are not engineers. They’re not scientists. They’re not economists. They’re activists. There are ‘studies’ written by progressive organizations which contain only scant numbers or facts, and instead speak a lot about social justice. From the ‘Executive Summary’ of one of the reports of the [Apollo Alliance](http://apolloalliance.org/reports/) cited earlier: > [@](#): > > The project of building a clean-energy economy will become a powerful engine of expanding employment opportunities throughout the U.S. economy. Accord-ing to a study that PERI recently completed with the Center for American Progress (CAP),1 clean-energy investments at the level of about $150 billion per year—i.e. around one percent of U.S. GDP—can generate about 1.7 million net new jobs throughout the U.S. economy. This is not self-financing. This is not a pathway to a new type of economy. This is 150 billion dollars per year (!!) paid to ‘create jobs’. That’s more than seven times the budget of NASA. Double the budget of the Department of Education. A third of the U.S. military budget. They then go on to say that this will create a rising tide of new technologies which private companies can exploit, making the economy stronger. This is a bare assertion, however. No actual evidence is provided regarding how this is supposed to happen. They actually say this: > [@](#): > > To maximize opportunities for decent job opportunities, clean-energy investment poli-cies need to operate in tandem with high-quality and widely-accessible training pro-grams; minimum wage laws that set a ‘living wage’ standard throughout the country; and a more favorable environment for union or-ganizing among low-wage workers. So… Before this can even work, you need a national ‘living wage’ law, and you need to make it even easier for unions to form. Because we all know, a unionized workforce is the best way to cheaper energy and global competitiveness… This is just the same old liberal dogma dressed up in new clothes. Wow! We’ve found a problem where the correct solution just HAPPENS to be taxes on the rich, lots of money to the poor an minorities, more unions, and higher minimum wages! If we just do all these things, we’re on the road to a newer, happier, greener economy! I guess this is the closest thing I could find to an ‘action plan’ that is even remotely specific: > [@](#): > > The Ten-Point Plan for Good Jobs and Energy Independence > > 1. Promote Advanced Technology & Hybrid Cars: Begin today to provide incentives for converting domestic assembly lines to manufacture highly efficient cars, transitioning the fleet to American made advanced technology vehicles, increasing consumer choice and strengthening the US auto industry. This is already happening, and most of these car companies are at full prodution on hybrids. But there’s no real proof yet that this is the best technology, and I’m not sure spending gobs of money to transition assembly lines over faster than they already are is a very good idea. Hybrid sales are very dependent on oil prices and the economy in general. > [@](#): > > 1. Invest In More Efficient Factories: Make innovative use of the tax code and economic development systems to promote more efficient and profitable manufacturing while saving energy through environmental retrofits, improved boiler operations, and industrial cogeneration of electricity, retaining jobs by investing in plants and workers. Factories already work their asses off to be energy efficient. My company does work in this area. They are pretty close to optimum economic efficiency now, when you consider the costs of capital, downtime, the cost of process re-engineering, etc. If they weren’t, they’d be investing the money themselves. So I not that this one suggests ‘innovative use of the tax code’. In other words, punish 'em until they obey. > [@](#): > > 1. Encourage High Performance Building: Increase investment in construction of “green buildings” and energy efficient homes and offices through innovative financing and incentives, improved building operations, and updated codes and standards, helping working families, businesses, and government realize substantial cost savings. Again, very vague. No cost numbers mentioned. Estimates I’ve heard say that making any serious changes to these things will cost a fortune - which is why we’re not doing them already. > [@](#): > > 1. Increase Use of Energy Efficient Appliances: Drive a new generation of highly efficient manufactured goods into widespread use, without driving jobs overseas, by linking higher energy standards to consumer and manufacturing incentives that increase demand for new durable goods and increase investment in US factories. I know something about this too. And again, we’re already making appliances that are quite efficient. If there was any low hanging fruit here, we’d already be grabbing it. The problem is that if you want to take, say, a dishwasher and make it more energy efficient, it costs a lot of money. And the cost increases as your desired efficiency goes up. > [@](#): > > 1. Modernize Electrical Infrastructure: Deploy the best available technology like scrubbers to existing plants, protecting jobs and the environment; research new technology to capture and sequester carbon and improve transmission for distributed renewable generation. Carbon sequestration research is fine. But currently, it’s extremely expensive and we really don’t know how to make it much cheaper. Carbon isn’t a trace element like other pollutants - it’s the main result of combustion, and we create a hell of a lot of it. It’s a non-trivial problem to collect and store that much carbon. Certainly there are no ‘green jobs’ for low income workers or any savings to the economy here for a long, long time. > [@](#): > > 1. Expand Renewable Energy Development: Diversify energy sources by promoting existing technologies in solar, biomass and wind while setting ambitious but achievable goals for increasing renewable generation, and promoting state and local policy innovations that link clean energy and jobs. I happen to think the pace of development of renewables is already going pretty strong. This is probably one of the least objectionable items, however, so long as it’s done at a relatively low level. > [@](#): > > 1. Improve Transportation Options: Increase mobility, job access, and transportation choice by investing in effective multimodal networks including bicycle, local bus and rail transit, regional high-speed rail and magnetic levitation rail projects. Yes, yes. More bicycles, buses and trains. Because Americans have repeatedly shown that that’s how they really want to travel. I’ve read a lot of analysis of high-speed rail, and the only corridor in the U.S. where it’s even remotely feasible is New York to Washington. And Maglev? Uh huh. > [@](#): > > 1. Reinvest In Smart Urban Growth: Revitalize urban centers to promote strong cities and good jobs, by rebuilding and upgrading local infrastructure including road maintenance, bridge repair, and water and waste water systems, and by expanding redevelopment of idled urban “brownfield” lands, and by improving metropolitan planning and governance. Rebuilding the inner cities as a ‘green jobs’ project. Because that will encourage everyone to flock back into the city centers they’ve been running away from for fifty years. > [@](#): > > 1. Plan For A Hydrogen Future: Invest in long term research & development of hydrogen fuel cell technology, and deploy the infrastructure to support hydrogen powered cars and distributed electricity generation using stationary fuel cells, to create jobs in the industries of the future. There are many problems with a hydrogen infrastructure, and it’s not even remotely clear that this is something we want to do. A few more incremental improvements in batteries, and hydrogen will look like a bad idea. > [@](#): > > 1. Preserve Regulatory Protections: Encourage balanced growth and investment through regulation that ensures energy diversity and system reliability, that protects workers and the environment, that rewards consumers, and that establishes a fair framework for emerging technologies. Right. Because you can’t have a strong, green economy without regulating everyone to death. 'Cause if you leave people alone, they might buy cars and live in the suburbs and not ‘invest’ enough in the things you want their money spent on. > [@](#): > > As an aside, I find the way the o.p. is stated to be disingenuous and intellectually offensive. Funny, I could say the same thing about the entire ‘green jobs’ movement. For the record, I was seriou in the OP. I just didn’t express myself well. I know what a traditional green job might look like, but they way I hear advocates of the ‘green economy’ talk about it, I thought I must be missing something. What triggered this for me was watching the McLaughlin Group, where Eleanor Clift went off about how the recession was going to be fixed by transitioning to a ‘green economy’. I hadn’t paid much attention to the ‘green jobs’ stuff until then, but that made me sit up and go, “wha? How’s it going to do that?”. And yes, I was and still am skeptical. And I think for good reason. > [@](#): > > Instead of either explicitly stating a position to be defended or asking for honest debate, it insincerely presents a question in passive-aggressive form accompanied by innuendo and semantic baiting. Surely the o.p. can do better than this. Yeah, that NEVER happens around here. Especially when people ask questions about George Bush. But you’re right. I can do better than that. I let my annoyance with the subject get the best of me. Unfortunately, now that I’ve learned more about it, I’m even more annoyed. I didn’t realize just how much of a stalking horse it was for the same old liberal platform. ---
**Author:** ![wmfellows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c2a13f/32.png) [@wmfellows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wmfellows)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/39 "2009-09-09T13:57:40Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Serendipity cannot be planned. At best, you can use a shotgun, spraying technology all over the place hoping some of it sticks somewhere you never thought of. > > … I’d just like to see an actual plan. It seems to me that you desire what is not actually possible, eh? Come on Stone, I think you’re letting your ideology get in the way of being reasonable: > [@](#): > > I didn’t realize just how much of a stalking horse it was for the same old liberal platform. You are looking for said conclusions I would opine. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241/40 "2009-09-09T14:21:11Z")
If I am, I didn’t have to look very hard. Van Jones is supposed to be the ‘expert’ on this. So much so that the White House hired him to run the whole show. His expertise, from what I can tell, comes from writing “Green Collar Jobs” and founding Green For All. Well, it turns out that his book is nothing more than a political rant - the exerpts available online do nothing but attack the handling of Katrina, the Iraq war, and talk about racism. From the reviews I’ve read, the entire book is like that. And this is supposed to be the clarion call for the movement. This book was also the first cite offered in this thread when I asked how Green Jobs are supposed to actually save the economy. His organization, Green for All, looks pretty much like an organization set up to push for more unions, higher wages, and hundreds of billions of dollars that will be pushed down into the hands of primarily minority groups. I doubt if the organization employs a single engineer. At least T-Boone Pickens had numbers behind his proposal. This is nothing but Hot Air and radical politics mixed together. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/someone-explain-green-jobs-please/509241.md?page=3)