Update on State Energy and Environmental News

by William Yeatman on August 24, 2011

in Blog

California

Last Friday, the New York Times reported that California has spent half of $186 million in stimulus money earmarked for energy efficiency, in order to create 538 full time jobs, at a cost of almost $173,000 per job. For more on the dubious economics behind the President’s push for green jobs, read this testimony by Ken Green of the American Enterprise Institute.

Massachusetts

In 2008, buoyed by $58 million in subsidies from the Massachusetts government, Evergreen Solar opened a solar power components manufacturing plant in Devens. A year later, the company moved operations to China. Last week, it announced it was bankrupt, with more than $450 million in debt. Massachusetts is owed more than $40 million, but it is unlikely to recoup any money.

Gulf Coast

At Master Resource, Kevin Mooney reported last Thursday that ten oil rigs have left the Gulf of Mexico since the Obama Administration imposed a moratorium on deepwater oil and gas drilling in May 2010.  There were 33 rigs in operation at the time of the BP disaster, which means that 30 % of rigs have departed. And they aren’t coming back. The rigs left the Gulf for locations in Egypt, Congo, French Guiana, Liberia, Nigeria and Brazil.

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