Just when California is about to start closing the gap with Texas and
Iowa in the amount of wind energy it produces, there’s a move afoot by
out-of-state oil companies to pull the rug out from under us and thwart
the development of these projects.

Located in more than 10 California counties and totaling 3,000 MW in
capacity (enough to power about a million homes, and much more in the
pipeline), these projects will more than double the current amount of wind energy in our state.
In addition, they will create more than 3,000 construction jobs and
hundreds of permanent operations jobs, in addition to indirect jobs.

For example, some of the turbine towers will be built at a
manufacturing plant in Fontana in San Bernardino County. Hundreds of
other jobs will also go into the development of needed transmission
infrastructure. These are quality, high-wage jobs, employing
Californians of all skill levels — from engineers to manufacturers,
laborers to biologists, real estate professionals to crane operators.

These projects will also generate on the order of $60 million in
property taxes every year – obviously a benefit as the economy has
taken its toll on local governments.

The wind industry is concerned about oil companies spending millions of
dollars on a ballot proposition to overturn our clean energy laws
because these laws are what attracted this unprecedented level of clean
energy development to the state. Our
companies based their investments on the state’s regulatory policies,
and they need regulatory certainty to maintain their investment.
Gutting AB 32 would send a very bad message to this emerging market.

While the effects of climate change may be less obvious, voters have
been reminded lately of the other dangers of fossil fuels — the oil
spill in the Gulf Coast, the recent coal mine disaster – graphically
demonstrating why we need to move away from fossil fuels and shift to
cleaner, home-grown, modern technologies such as wind energy. And
right here at home, California is host to some of the worst air
pollution in the nation because of our reliance on fossil fuels. Over
91 percent of Californians live in counties that were assigned failing
air quality grades by the American Lung Association (ALA).

Wind energy, of course, produces electricity without emitting any
pollutants or greenhouse gases at all, it uses no water, requires no
mining or drilling for fuel, and poses no national security threats.

We need to maintain the wind industry’s substantial investments in
California to clean up our air.  If this proposition were to pass, it
would put a serious damper on our progress. That’s why the California
Wind Energy Association strongly opposes the Dirty Energy Proposition,
and we’ve made defeating it a high priority this year.