(task) Fortune -- In US, There Are Twice as Many Solar Workers as Coal Miners

USRS NYRS Northern Manhattan (NM RN), Rockaway RN, Canarsie RN

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solar, post petrochemical political economy, petro, renewables

(task) Fortune -- Twice as Many Solar Workers Than Coal Miners
In U.S., there are twice as many solar workers as coal miners

by Kirsten Korosec <http://fortune.com/author/kirsten-korosec/> @kirstenkorosec <https://twitter.com/kirstenkorosec> JANUARY 16, 2015, 11:06 AM EST
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> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#inline-auto>
> Korosec writes: "SolarCity, the largest installer of residential solar systems in the U.S., nearly doubled its workforce last year, hiring 4,000 people to do everything from system design and site surveys to installation and engineering."
>
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> Workers check solar panels on a factory roof. (photo: The Guardian)
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> <http://fortune.com/2015/01/16/solar-jobs-report-2014/>
>
> In US, There Are Twice as Many Solar Workers as Coal Miners
>
> By Kirsten Korosec, Fortune
>
> 17 January 15
>
>
> olarCity, the largest installer of residential solar systems in the U.S., nearly doubled its workforce last year, hiring 4,000 people to do everything from system design and site surveys to installation and engineering.
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> The hiring spree at SolarCity isn’t slowing; it’s picking up speed as the company attempts to install twice as many rooftop solar systems than last year and readies its 1.2 million-square foot factory in New York, which is scheduled to reach full production in 2017.
>
> SolarCity SCTY -2.21% plans to eclipse 2014’s hiring numbers, CEO Lyndon Rive tells Fortune. In 2016, SolarCity will hire “quite a bit more” than it will in 2015, Rive says, though he didn’t provide specific numbers.
>
>
>
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> Installers, panel makers, and even traditional fossil fuel energy companies helped U.S. solar employment grow nearly 22 percent in 2014.
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> SolarCity, the largest installer of residential solar systems in the U.S., nearly doubled its workforce last year, hiring 4,000 people to do everything from system design and site surveys to installation and engineering.
>
> The hiring spree at SolarCity isn’t slowing; it’s picking up speed as the company attempts to install twice as many rooftop solar systems than last year and readies its 1.2 million-square foot factory in New York, which is scheduled to reach full production in 2017.
>
> SolarCity SCTY -2.21% plans to eclipse 2014’s hiring numbers, CEO Lyndon Rive tells Fortune. In 2016, SolarCity will hire “quite a bit more” than it will in 2015, Rive says, though he didn’t provide specific numbers.
>
> The company’s expansion is indicative of what’s happening within the broader solar industry. More than 31,000 new solar jobs were created in the U.S. in 2014 bringing the total to 173,807—a 21.8 percent increase in employment since November 2013, according to a report released Thursday by The Solar Foundation. This is the second consecutive year that solar jobs have increased by at least 20 percent.
>
> The solar industry is still dwarfed by the 9.8 million workers that the American Petroleum Industry says are employed the oil and gas industry. However, the Solar Foundation is quick to point out the industry is starting to surpass some fossil fuel-related job categories.
>
> Solar already employs more people than coal mining, which has 93,185 workers, and has added 50 percent more jobs in 2014 than the oil and gas pipeline construction industry (10,529) and the crude petroleum and natural gas extraction industry (8,688) did combined, according to the Solar Foundation.
>
> One out of every 78 new jobs created in the U.S. over the past 12 months were created by the solar industry, representing nearly 1.3 percent of all jobs created in the country. Solar companies surveyed for the fifth annual census plan to add another 36,000 employees this year.
>
> “That’s just insane,” Rive says. “The solar industry is literally contributing to the job growth of the U.S. economy—and it’s just so understated.”
>
> Third-party financing that allows homeowners to lease solar systems, a stabilizing manufacturing sector and utility-scale solar developers scrambling to finish projects before the federal investment tax credit drops from 30 percent to 10 percent on Jan. 1, 2017 has helped drive growth, says Andrea Luecke, president and executive director of The Solar Foundation.
>
> The solar job-growth trend has spilled beyond the confines of companies solely dedicated to the renewable energy source.
>
> NRG Energy, one of the largest U.S. independent power producers and owner of 88 fossil fuel and nuclear plants, is expanding its solar business rapidly. NRG’s Home Solar group, the residential solar division of NRG Home, hired 500 people in the past 12 months and now has 1,200 workers.
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> “We’re growing explosively in several markets,” NRG Home Solar president Kelcy Pegler Jr. said in an interview with Fortune on Thursday following the company’s investor day presentation.
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> As a result, Pegler’s residential home solar group plans to add “hundreds of jobs” this quarter and will double its current headcount in the next two years.
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> NRG Energy, which employs 10,000 people, reorganized last year into three business lines: NRG Business, NRG Home and NRG Renew. The company NRG -1.02% has a number of other solar-related jobs within NRG Renew and NRG Home, including its power on the go division which was expanded after the 2014 acquisition of portable solar power company Goal Zero.
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> Overall, solar is one of the fastest growing segments within NRG Energy and the NRG Home group, a business unit that also includes the company’s electricity providers, home services, power on the go products and electric vehicle charging, Pegler says.
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> Residential solar’s role in creating jobs is largely under appreciated by the public, he says: “These aren’t just part-time jobs either, these are careers.”
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> Comments   <http://readersupportednews.org/component/jcomments/feed/com_content/28105>  <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#>
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> <http://readersupportednews.org/user-profile/userprofile/ronnewmexico>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#>-2 # <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#comment-462421> ronnewmexico 2015-01-17 16:53
> It is so sad the environmental industry focuses on Keystone, A good thing to fight against but really minor as it stops carbon not one iota…..and does not focus on increasing tax incentive for roof top solar installations and such and/or a requirement in new house construction to have a solar component…a part of the house, lighting whatever..that is required by law to be primarly solar or wind….
>
> So sad they distract us so.
>
>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/user-profile/userprofile/ronnewmexico>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#>+5 # <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#comment-462424> ronnewmexico 2015-01-17 17:01
> As a aside... the investment community is way way abstract from the reality of things. Solar stocks tend to go up and down on the price of oil.. but electricity is inevitably never produced from oil but natgas and coal. And solar choice for home roof top application or commercial application is little related to the going price for coal or gas….it being a long term acquisition.
>
> Why not make it a requirement in part of new home construction. The technology is there to make it competitive with nonrenewable source and it would incentivise the sale construction and purchase of new homes. A new technology..it becomes the reason to buy a new home…all is incentivized…
>
> It is so sad short term corportists run our politic on the rep and dem side, with few exceptions .
>
>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/user-profile/userprofile/RMDC>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#>+4 # <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#comment-462508> RMDC 2015-01-17 20:35
> This is all good news. It is likely that it will grow a lot more for a long time.
>
> There would be ten times more jobs if energy efficient renovations on houses were subsidized. Insulating houses and installying new efficient appliances save energy and that means no energy needs to be generated. It makes solar panels even better.
>
> But the fossile fuel companies own the US government.
>
>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/user-profile/userprofile/ronnewmexico>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#>-2 # <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#comment-462534> ronnewmexico 2015-01-17 22:02
> To add to that excellent comment R…here in NM the prior governor established by order a specific in the law subsequent to zoneing and construction which required new homes to be insulated to a certain high degree..
>
> His sucessor the next governor immediately acted to remove that from establishment as a state requirement.
> Subsequent to legal challenge..she failed and it was reinstated.
>
> But I say right here and now…she will be on the next vice presidential ticket, here in the US.
> And she was soundly reelected.
>
>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/user-profile/userprofile/brux>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#>+3 # <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#comment-462542> brux 2015-01-17 23:21
> FINALLY - SOME GOOD NEWS !
>
>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/user-profile/userprofile/26293>
> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#> <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#>0 # <http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/28105-in-us-there-are-twice-as-many-solar-workers-as-coal-miners#comment-462579> backwards_cinderella 2015-01-18 04:22
> SolarCity is here in Buffalo. A brand new solar plant just opened on the river bend where steel mills used to be. Here in NY, we have banned fracking & we are dedicated to solar power & wind power. When you come up Rte. 5 along Lake Erie, instead of seeing Bethlehem Steel polluting the water & the sky, now you see pristine white wind mills. What a beautiful view. & all along the high southern hills where we all love to hunt & hike, there are wind mills in the corn fields. It's a heavenly sight & the way of the future.
>
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