Lots of Green in the Stimulus Package

Reader Contribution by Jessie Fetterling

President Obama signed the $787 billion economic stimulus package today, and it includes a lot of green spending. An article in Grist says that a total of about $82 billion of that money will be used for green initiatives, including investing in renewable energy, energy efficiency, public transportation, improvements to the grid, and training for green jobs.

The hope is that by investing in green energy, both economic and environmental problems will be solved at the same time. Right now about 400,000 people work in the renewable energy industry in the United States, but that number is predicted to be in the millions in the near future. (Read 37 Million Green Jobs Are Possible.) An example of a source for green jobs is in the wind energy industry. According to the Worldwatch Institute, every megawatt of installed wind energy capacity creates 4.85 full-time jobs in the United States. Not bad, but let’s hope this stimulus package works.

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