Obama Claims Credit for Bush-Era Wind Farms

The Obama administration is crediting its stimulus plan with creating up to 50,000 jobs on 70 wind farms — even though nearly half were built before the stimulus cash began to flow.

Of the 70 wind farms that received $4.4 billion in federal energy grants through the stimulus program, 11 were actually erected during the Bush administration.

Another 19 were built before any of the stimulus money for wind farms was distributed beginning on Sept. 1, 2009, according to a report from the Investigative Reporting Workshop at American University in Washington, D.C. And 14 farms were already producing electricity by that date.

Yet in testimony before Congress in April, Matt Rogers, the Department of Energy’s senior adviser on stimulus, claimed the wind farms funded by the stimulus created up to 50,000 jobs. He said: “These programs were particularly effective in getting money out the door quickly to put people back to work on great projects that would otherwise have been idled in the face of the Great Recession.”

The wind farm program, known as Section 1603, reimburses developers of renewable energy facilities, such as wind farms, up to 30 percent of a project’s cost.

One wind farm, in western New York State, consisted of 88 huge turbines. Its developer received $61.8 million in stimulus grants on Sept. 1, 2009 — 15 months after construction ended.

Another farm, in Mahanoy, Pa., featured 51 turbines and brought its developer $59.1 million in stimulus money. But 50 of the turbines had been built in 2008 — including 31 constructed before Obama was elected.

The Investigative Reporting Workshop also points out, in an article appearing on the MSNBC website, that the Section 1603 grant program does not require that firms receiving stimulus money reinvest it in the United States. And the Workshop’s investigation found that foreign-owned companies had built most of the turbines that were being installed.