Actions Congress can take to protect U.S. jobs and renewable energy growth
Dear Members of Congress,
We want to emphasize the critical role our job-creating industries play
in the American economy and to tell you about the effects COVID-19 is
having on our workers and our businesses.
First and foremost, COVID-19 is a human health crisis and we are
grateful that Congress is making paid sick leave and family care
provisions available to American workers, including wind and solar
workers. We think broad policies like this can be helpful in supporting
families and small and medium-sized businesses of all kinds. The sooner
everybody gets healthy, the faster our economy recovers.
Wind and solar are the central pillars of the clean grid of the future.
The wind and solar industries are among the fastest growing industries
in our country and are also among the fastest ways to reduce carbon
emissions. Unfortunately, the COVID-19 crisis is putting our economic
momentum at risk. To avoid catastrophic job loss and keep our
investments active, the solar and wind industries need to know that the
policies previously provided by Congress remain available and usable
despite delays in our schedules caused by the COVID-19 crisis.
The wind and solar industries are being harmed by delivery delays,
necessary employee absences, serious financing concerns, and project
cancellations or postponements. This is jeopardizing the jobs of our
combined 364,000 workers, threatening to sidetrack tens of billions of
dollars in investment.
As our first priority, our two industries are focusing on direct impacts
of the COVID-19 crisis. In that spirit, we are jointly asking for
policies that can sustain our member companies’ ability to operate and
keep planned investment and job-generating deployment on track in the
face of this crisis and realize the benefits that Congress has already
created for the wind and solar industries. While we may differ in our
prioritization of these proposals, we are in strong agreement that these
actions will allow our companies to effectively utilize the policies
that Congress has already approved to facilitate wind and solar
deployment. First, an extension of wind and solar commence construction
and safe harbor provisions would support the recovery of our two
industries and minimize problems created by COVID-19. Additionally, the
ability to receive direct payments for or refundability of our tax
credits would keep our current pipeline of projects moving forward.
As Congress looks for ways to further revitalize the U.S. economy, the
wind and solar industries can play important roles. More specifically,
extensions to the investment tax credit and production tax credit and
the addition of storage to the ITC would allow our member companies to
hire thousands of additional workers and inject billions in the US
economy. We have ample evidence to demonstrate that these tax credits
create billions of dollars of private investment and generate tens of
thousands of jobs.
We offer these policy suggestions to help address the direct impacts of
this crisis and the longer-term desire to further revitalize the U.S.
economy, and we stand ready to work with Congress to ensure the wind and
solar industries can do our part to keep Americans employed and U.S.
investment flowing.
Sincerely,
Abigail Ross Hopper, Esq. Thomas C. Kiernan
President & CEO CEO
Solar Energy Industries Association American Wind Energy Association
