Conservatively Speaking

More lessons from Spain about renewable energy

Posted by Mary Lazich on March 15, 2010

Legislation

Last month, I blogged that Wisconsin, that is considering radical global warming legislation, should learn from what has occurred in green-conscious Spain.

The March 2009 Spanish “Study of the effects on employments of public aid to renewable energy sources” said renewable energy policies implemented in Spain were “terribly economically counterproductive” and that the “green jobs” agenda “in fact kills jobs.” I wrote:

“Here is the most damning point of the study: Spain’s experience pinpointed as a model by President Obama can be expected to result in a loss of 2.2 jobs for every job created, or nearly 9 jobs lost for every four created. Gabriel Calzada, an economics professor at the Universidad Rey Juan Carlos and author of the study reports the premiums paid for solar, biomass, wave and wind power that  are charged to consumers in their bills amounted to a $774,000 cost for each Spanish ‘green job’ created since 2000.

Here is my blog.

Solar power was intended to be an economic boost for Spain. The New York Times reports, “Half the solar power installed globally in 2008 was installed in Spain.”

Then the bubble burst. The newspaper reports, “As low-quality, poorly designed solar plants sprang up on Spain’s plateaus, Spanish officials came to realize that they would have to subsidize many of them indefinitely, and that the industry they had created might never produce efficient green energy on its own.  In September the government abruptly changed course, cutting payments and capping solar construction. Puertollano’s brief boom turned bust. Factories and stores shut, thousands of workers lost jobs, foreign companies and banks abandoned contracts that had already been negotiated.”

Wisconsin would be wise not to travel the same path as Spain.