New York (Platts)--19Apr2010/742 am EDT/1142 GMT

The US ethanol and solar power industries--two key components of the drive by the US to wean itself from hydrocarbon dependence--will need continued government subsidies and grants in the coming years if they are to deliver on their promise, officials representing both industries said Sunday.

In separate interviews on the television program Platts Energy Week, Wesley Clark, the retired US general and co-chairman of ethanol lobbying group Growth Energy, and Rhone Resch, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association, both made appeals for continued government support as part of an effort not only to reduce the country's imports of foreign oil, but also as an engine for jobs growth.

Clark, responding to a question about whether ethanol's success hinges on US government tax credits and a tariff on ethanol imports, responded that the domestic ethanol industry is "very important for the American economy, and very important for national security."

Clark expressed confidence that the US government will continue its policies of tax credits, an import tariff and an expansion of ethanol's blend in gasoline to 15% from the current 10% because, "this is very, very big business for America. Ethanol is 500,000 jobs; it's over $66 billion in 2008."

Going to the so-called E15 blend for gasoline, something the Environmental Protection Agency is expected to rule on in the near future, and continuing incentives such as the 45 cents/gal tax credit for blending, will add "at least another 135,000 permanent jobs and maybe a half-million construction jobs, and we'll see a dramatic influx of investment money into the sector," said Clark.

Clark also pointed out that, "there's lots of government support for just about everything we do in America," including for the oil and gas industries. He also shot down suggestions that the US should end its 54 cents/gal tariff on the import of ethanol. The main beneficiary of such a move would be Brazil, with its massive sugar cane-based ethanol industry. But Clark said there was no reason to allow "subsidized foreign fuel to compete with domestically produced fuel, when that foreign fuel is the beneficiary of improper child labor practices," and a cause of "environmental degradation in Brazil."

Clark, who supported US President Barack Obama when he ran for the White House in 2008, said that both the administration and Congress "have been very friendly to the concept of strengthening American industry and strengthening American jobs."

Rhone Resch of the solar industry group made an appeal similar to Clark's on the impact of continued government support to US workers.

Resch said it was "critical" for the solar and wind power industries to see the renewal of the federal government's Treasury grant program, which is due to expire at the end of the year.

He said the program, which filled in for the moribund investment tax credit market, accounted for 270 projects last year and $300 million in investments in the sector, creating some 17,000 new jobs, despite the program taking effect only in September.

"It's critical that if you want to continue to grow the solar industry, the wind industry and others, you need to extend that Treasury grant program," said Resch.

--Robert DiNardo, robert_dinardo@platts.com