Fact Pack

Fossil fuels – coal, oil, and natural gas – dirty the nation’s air, consume and pollute water, hurt plant and animal life, create toxic wastes, and cause global warming. Using nuclear fuel poses serious safety risks and there is no long-term plan for safe storage of nuclear waste. Renewable energy can provide immediate environmental benefits by avoiding these risks. Clean renewable energy does not include any sort of combustion technologies, nuclear power, or hydropower large enough to block entire rivers.

Renewable energy can supply a significant portion of the energy needs of the U.S., and create public benefits, including environmental improvement, increased fuel diversity, national security, and economic development. These benefits, however, are often not reflected in the prices paid for energy, placing renewable energy at a severe disadvantage when competing against fossil fuels and nuclear power. That’s where renewable portfolio standards come in – they are an effective tool that states can use to boost the renewables market.

RPS Laws are Effective

Existing state RPS laws will provide over 12,400 megawatts (MW) of new renewable power by 2012 – an increase of more than 90% over total 1997 U.S. levels (excluding hydropower).(1)

This represents enough clean power to meet the electricity needs of 7.6 million homes.(1)

The RPS initiatives in California and Texas (see SERC’s RPS Renewable Portfolio Standards State Activity Page) created the two largest markets for new renewable energy growth.(1)

Total new renewable energy production from state RPS programs will reduce as much carbon dioxide – the main greenhouse gas that causes global warming – as taking 5.4 million cars off the road or planting over 1.6 billion trees.(1)

States with RPS Laws Are Meeting Their Goals

In California, approximately 11 percent, or roughly 30 billion kilowatt hours, of the state’s total electricity production (as of April 2004) comes from renewable resources, according to a report by the California Public Utilities Commission.(2)

The majority of electricity suppliers in New Jersey have met their RPS requirement.(3)

Texas has met and surpassed its 2002 RPS requirement of 400 MW.(4)

Wisconsin has met its 2002 RPS target of 0.5% and has “banked” enough excess renewable kilowatt-hours to achieve its 2011 target of 2.2%.(5)

RPS Makes Economic Sense

A recent analysis by the Energy Information Administration showed that, even with conservative assumptions, a 10% renewable-based energy supply would lower the nation’s energy bills by $15 billion per year by 2020 compared to a heavily fossil-based supply mix.(6)

Taxes received from geothermal operations are a significant source of revenue. For example, in 1993, Nevada’s geothermal power plants paid $800,000 in county taxes and $1.7 million in property taxes. In addition, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management collects nearly $20 million each year in rent and royalties from geothermal plants producing power on federal lands in Nevada – half of these revenues are returned to the state.(7)

The renewables industry is growing. The global Photovoltaic (PV) industry earned $1.3 billion worldwide in 1997, with the U.S. PV industry collecting $380 million.(8) The global wind industry is expected to sell $3.8 billion in equipment in 2001. In the United States, investors will pour $1 billion into projects in 2001.(9)

The 240 MW of wind capacity installed in Iowa in 1998 and 1999 produced $2 million per year in tax payments to counties and school districts and $640,000 per year in direct lease payments to landowners.(10)

The 143 wind turbines in the 107-MW Lake Benton I project in Minnesota, installed in early 1998, brought $250 million in investment. Lake Benton’s director of economic development says that each 100 MW of wind development generates about $1 million annually in property tax revenue. Additionally, farmers hosting a wind farm on their property through leasing plans can expect $40 to $55 per acre per year revenue on top of earnings from farming and grazing, with the wind turbines occupying only a small fraction of their land.(10)

RPS Laws are Good for the Environment

Energy production and use currently account for nearly 80 percent of air pollution, more than 88 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, and more environmental damage than any other human activity.(11)

Nationally, annual coal power plant emissions are responsible for 40 percent of carbon dioxide (CO2), 76 percent of sulfur dioxide (SO2), 59 percent of nitrogen oxides (NOx) and 37 percent of mercury (Hg). These four pollutants are the major cause of some of the most serious environmental problems the nation faces, including acid rain, smog, mercury contamination, and global warming.(12)

Geothermal power alone saves California approximately 2.5 million tons of CO2 emissions annually – the equivalent emissions from driving an average passenger car 6.3 billion miles a year.(13)

The sample bill included in this package carefully defines renewable power to exclude environmentally harmful sources such as nuclear, large hydropower, and unregulated biomass.

RPS Laws Help Create Jobs

Nevada’s RPS is projected to create 8,092 installation, and operation and maintenance jobs over 10 years. If the entire manufacturing process is added to the installation and O&M employment, the total rises to 27,229 over ten years.(14)

Even with conservative assumptions for in-state manufacturing for wind farm components, wind power could provide 70% more one-year jobs and more than three times a many permanent jobs as natural gas, over a 20-year time frame. Wind power could also provide property tax payments to local governments distributed across a wider area of the state, conserve water that natural gas plants would otherwise consume, and pay royalties to farmers, ranchers, and other rural landowners.(15)

Wind and PV offer 40% more jobs per dollar than coal.(9)

In 1996, the U.S. geothermal energy industry provided about 12,300 direct domestic jobs, and an additional 27,700 indirect domestic jobs.(7)

One megawatt (MW) of PV relies upon 69,650 hours of labor. This translates into approximately 36 person-years.(9)

A 37.5-MW wind farm would create over 356,250 hours of work, or 180 person-years. Two thousand megawatts of wind power, as is expected in Texas shortly, will create 19 million hours of work, or 9,694 person-years.(9)

Not including the labor required to manufacture parts for wind turbines and wind farm support, the 240 MW of wind capacity installed in Iowa in 1998 and 1999 produced 200 six-month long construction jobs and 40 permanent maintenance and operations jobs.(10)

Not including the labor required to manufacture parts for wind turbines and wind farm support, the 143 wind turbines in Minnesota’s 107-MW Lake Benton I project, installed in early 1998, brought 10 full-time jobs to Lincoln and Pipestone counties, the poorest in Minnesota.(10)

A Balanced Energy Portfolio Includes Renewables

Solar Power

Solar power works best when we need energy the most. On hot days, when we use the most energy, solar power generation is at its peak. Solar systems installed in homes and businesses reduce the need for power from polluting fuels, especially during peak hours of energy usage. Solar photovoltaic can often be applied to unused spaces such as roofs and the tops of parking structures. They can be used to power park shelters, restrooms, and other small public buildings.

Geothermal Energy

Geothermal energy uses heat from below the earth’s surface to produce electricity, heat buildings, and heat water systems. Geothermal applications cover a range of uses, from small-scale geothermal heat pumps used in homes to large-scale power plants that provide electricity.

Wind Power

Wind power ranges from large wind “farms” consisting of multiple turbines that are several stories high to “small wind” systems that you can install in your backyard. Wind farms can produce clean energy on a large scale while ranching and farming continues around the turbines. Farmers can earn additional annual income by hosting wind turbines with negligible impact on the productivity of their land from traditional crops (since the turbines take up so little land).

Biopower

Biopower plants reduce emissions in a variety of ways depending on the feedstocks.  Dedicated energy crops absorb carbon dioxide as they grow, offsetting the carbon dioxide that a power plant emits when it burns the plants to generate electricity. If left on the ground or sent to landfills, agricultural residues, urban wood waste, and landfill gas would emit methane but, if they are collected or captured and burned as fuel, the power plant emits carbon dioxide, which has only a small fraction of the global warming potential of methane.

Dams Not Damned

In the context of renewable energy, low-impact, small-scale hydro, and micro-hydro projects (those installations producing less than 20 MW of electricity) are considered by some as more environmentally sensitive and appropriate than traditional large-scale projects. Low-impact hydropower projects can be built using ecologically sensitive techniques that take the needs of marine life, such as salmon, into account.

Sources:
(1) “Fact Sheet: Renewable Energy Standards at Work in the States.” Union of Concerned Scientists. 28 September 2004 <http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/renewable_energy/page.cfm?pageID=47>.
(2) “RPS California.” Renewable Energy Policy Project (REPP). 28 September 2004 <http://www.repp.org/articles/static/1/California_RPS.html>.
(3) “RPS New Jersey.” Renewable Energy Policy Project (REPP). 28 September 2004 <http://www.repp.org/articles/static/1/New_Jersey_RPS.html>.
(4) “RPS Texas.” Renewable Energy Policy Project (REPP). 28 September 2004 <http://www.repp.org/articles/static/1/Texas_RPS.html>.
(5) “RPS Wisconsin.” Renewable Energy Policy Project (REPP). 28 September 2004 <http://www.repp.org/articles/static/1/Wisconsin_RPS.html>.
(6) Sterzinger, George, Executive Director, Renewable Energy Policy Project. “Energy: Maximizing Resources; Meeting Our Needs; Retaining Jobs.” Testimony to the House Government Reform Committee and Subcommittee on Energy Policy, Natural Resources, and Regulatory Affairs. 17 June 2002. 28 September 2004 <http://www.repp.org/articles/static/1/binaries/repp_testimony_boston.pdf>.
(7) “Dollars from Sense: The Economic Benefits of Renewable Energy (DOE/GO-10097-261).” Washington, D.C.: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), September 1997. 28 September 2004 <http://www.nrel.gov/docs/legosti/fy97/20505.pdf>.
(8) Assumes $6.25 per installed Watt. Maycock, Paul. “U.S. firms shipped 60.8 MW of PV in 1999.” PV News 19.3.
(9) Five thousand megawatts (MW) of wind capacity is expected worldwide in 2001, with 1,300 MW in the United States. Total cost is assumed to be $749,000 per MW. Singh, Virinder with BBC Research and Consulting and Jeffrey Fehrs. “The Work That Goes Into Renewable Energy (Research Report No. 13).” Washington, D.C.: Renewable Energy Policy Project (REPP), November 2001. 29 September 2004 <http://www.repp.org/articles/static/1/binaries/LABOR_FINAL_REV.pdf>.
(10) “Wind Energy and Economic Development: Building Sustainable Jobs and Communities.” American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) Fact Sheet. 29 September 2004 <http://www.awea.org/pubs/factsheets/EconDev.PDF>.
(11) “What’s Energy?” Alliance to Save Energy. 29 September 2004 <http://www.ase.org/uploaded_files/powersmart/whtsenrgy.html>.
(12) Sanders, Bernie, Independent Representative, Vermont. “Closing the Dirty Old Powerplant Loophole.” Statement of Congressman Sanders on July 20, 2001. 29 September 2004 <http://bernie.house.gov/statements/2001-08-27-clean_air_act-ditry_power_plants.asp>.
(13) “Renewable Energy: There’s Even More You Should Know About Renewable Energy.” American Lung Association of California. 29 September 2004 <http://www.californialung.org/spotlight/cleanair02_renewable.html>.
(14) “The REPP Labor Calculator.” Washington, D.C.: Renewable Energy Policy Project (REPP), July 2003. 29 September 2004 <http://www.repp.org/articles/static/1/binaries/Labor_Calculator.pdf>.
(15) Madsen, Travis, Stephanie Bonin, and Matt Baker. “Wind Energy: Powering Economic Development for Colorado.” Denver, Colorado: Colorado Public Interest Research Foundation, November 2002. 29 September 2004 <http://copirg.org/report/windenergy11_02.pdf>.