Manufacturing in the renewable energy sector is on the rise in Texas, according to a trade association.
“Over the last 10 years we have seen ever-increasing manufacturing activity focused on the renewable energy sector,” said Tony Bennett, president and CEO of the Texas Association of Manufacturers.
The renewable energy industry had grown 10% in the five years before COVID-19 hit, according to media reports, with clean energy taking up 40% of the entire labor force last year.
“Technological advances and product demand drive certain manufacturing interests to serve these growing markets,” Bennett told the Lone Star Standard.
Manufacturers statewide provide jobs to about 908,000 Texas residents and these positions pay an annual average salary of $87,809, according to TAM data.
“We don’t have a great deal of specific renewable energy manufacturing members at the Texas Association of Manufacturers, but some manufacture components for the industry," Bennett said in an interview.
Those components for the renewable industry include equipment used to manufacture solar panels, the technology used to operate wind and solar farms, chemicals used to protect photovoltaics and operate heat pumps on geothermal systems, semiconductors and other electronic components used to manage or operate various renewable energy systems. They also include steel, fiberglass and polymers used to assemble wind turbines and solar arrays.
Bennett did not reply to questions about the Lone Star State losing 24,847 clean energy sector jobs out of 233,000 positions as of the end of July 2020, mostly due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Since COVID-19 began polluting our economy and its workforce, however, more than double the number of clean energy jobs that were created in the last three years were washed out,” Nathan Ryan, CEO of Blue Sky Partners, told the Austin Business Journal on Sept. 17.
Prior to the pandemic, Ryan said Texas was second to California in the number of clean energy jobs.
Ryan, a member of the Austin Economic Prosperity Commission, further stated that returning to pre-COVID-19 employment levels will require nearly 15 years.
“Even the largest clean energy division, energy efficiency, experienced a meager 0.1% job gain since the pandemic,” Ryan told Austin Business Journal. “Poor job gains match across the board for renewable electric power generation, clean fuels and clean transmission, distribution, and storage and clean vehicles.”
As previously reported, not only did Texans have to pay $3.1 billion for the electricity generated from renewable sources last year, they had to cover most of the cost of $2.4 billion in renewable energy subsidies that generators received. That equals about $67.9 per MWh for the 81.1 million MWhs generated by wind and solar generators last year.
"The subsidies have caused massive distortions in Texas' wholesale electricity market," Bill Peacock, policy director for Energy Alliance, told the Lone Star Standard.
