A Boom Sustained

[jpak]

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2010/08/a-boom-sustained

With challenges continuing to plague traditional manufacturing sectors in the U.S., many observers are looking to new industries, such as wind energy, to revitalize the manufacturing base. The wind industry, in fact, has already done much to bolster such hopes. As the U.S. wind market has grown, so has the wind industry's commitment to developing a domestic supply base and creating new American jobs, with employment growing seven-fold since 2005. Today, well over 240 U.S. facilities supply to the wind industry, and thousands of announced manufacturing jobs are in the pipeline.

But the news is not all good. While the potential for growth is significant, policy and market instability has left wind manufacturing facilities underutilized or even idle. In order to confront this issue, AWEA, the BlueGreen Alliance (BGA) and the United Steelworkers (USW) released a new report laying out the policies needed to grow U.S. wind energy manufacturing.

The report (PDF), titled “Winds of Change: A Manufacturing Blueprint for the Wind Industry,” includes information about the current status of the manufacturing sector for wind energy and provides a policy framework for increasing domestic content and American jobs. The pathway for growing U.S. supply chains is two-fold. First, the industry needs a long-term, stable market that will encourage investment and support demand for wind turbines; second, directed steps must be taken to support the manufacturing sector’s transition into the clean energy economy.

Signs of a Powerhouse

In recent years, the U.S. wind industry has made remarkable strides toward domestic supply. Even without strong policies in place, the wind industry has increased its domestic content in wind turbines from 25% in 2005, the first year in which a strong market for turbines existed, to approximately 50% in 2009. During this same period, the annual market for wind turbines quadrupled, giving the percentage increase in domestic content even greater significance; that is, more turbines being built and deployed in the U.S., coupled with increases in domestic content in each turbine, has meant even more growth for the U.S. wind industry supply chain.

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