Texas Blackout Shows Where the New Energy Jobs Are
Alternative energy is ascendant as fossil-fuel mainstays are losing the confidence of investors.
Where the jobs are.
Photographer: Ethan Miller/Getty Images
When millions of Texans lost power during the coldest weather to hit the Lone Star State in seven decades, Republican Governor Greg Abbott blamed frozen wind turbines and other forms of clean energy for the greatest forced blackout in U.S. history. Never mind that the grid operator in the second-largest state said alternative energy, generating 25% of its winter supply, contributed less than 13% to the outage, while fossil fuels — the overwhelming source of electricity — failed twice as much in the debacle.
Lost in Abbott's false narrative excoriating Democrats' Green New Deal is the reality that renewable energy is a boon to Texas, which is among the world's biggest contributors to global warming, and to the rest of the U.S. Renewables have been the fastest-growing source of new jobs during the past two years after E-commerce in discretionary consumer goods.