Company Backtracks on Using Stimulus Funds to Offshore Jobs
November 21, 2009
 An American-Chinese consortium that was seeking more than $400 million in federal stimulus money for a wind farm project that would have created jobs in China, backtracked on its decision after public outcry.
The Shenyang Power Group announced last week that it will build its wind-turbine plant in Texas. The project, originally estimated to create only 30 jobs in the U.S, but 2,000 in China, is now expected to employ approximately 1,000 American workers.
It’s an important victory for supporters of creating green jobs in the United States. A broad coalition of labor activists, green power advocates and their allies in Congress fought against the misuse of taxpayers’ money to offshore needed manufacturing jobs overseas.
Said International President Edwin D. Hill:
Stimulus money is intended for stimulating our economy, getting our workers back on the job. Pressure by the grassroots made sure our tax dollars weren’t used to outsource good jobs.
While a vital victory, Bob Baugh, executive director of the AFL-CIO Industrial Union Council says:
It’s a start, but it just shows how far we have to go [to catch up in the production of wind turbines and other clean-energy products]
As we reported earlier:
The Wall Street Journal cites Elizabeth Salerno, a spokeswoman for the American Wind Energy Association, who says that—in the first three quarters of 2009—there were 33 percent fewer announcements of U.S. turbine-factory expansions than in the comparable period of 2008.
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