They loom, but no layoffs at Vestas

Apr 9 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Pete Roper The Pueblo Chieftain, Colo.

Starting last January, the warning has come like a steady drumbeat -- unless Congress extends a federal tax credit for wind turbine users, Vestas and other wind-power manufacturers will have to start laying off workers in Colorado and elsewhere.

In the case of Vestas-American Wind Technology, the company has four plants in Colorado, totaling about 1,800 workers, including its plant south of Pueblo. Vestas officials have told Colorado's congressional delegation that 1,600 of its jobs are at risk unless the federal tax credit is extended into 2013 at the very least.

The warning has had Colorado's two senators -- Michael Bennet and Mark Udall -- scrambling to find some legislation they could attach the wind-power amendment to, but the results have been uniformly dismal. Four major pieces of legislation have been passed or debated in the Senate since January and the wind-power credit was either ignored or rejected.

The two Colorado Democrats are not alone in trying. Wind power has bipartisan support in the Senate, but the tax credit has been lumped together with a list of business tax credits that Republican lawmakers in particular are unwilling to support as a package because they cost as much as $20 billion.

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Asked last week if Vestas had actually laid off any workers yet, a company spokesman said no.

"We continue to be busy in our Colorado factories as we prepare for the construction and installation of about 20 new wind sites this year in the U.S. and Canada," said Andrew Longeteig, a Vestas spokesman. "If the (federal tax credit) is not extended, many of the industry's manufacturing jobs in the U.S., including at Vestas, could be affected later this year."

What the wind industry wants is a multi-year extension of the tax credit that was first established in 1992. The credit provides wind turbine users with a 2.2 cent per kilowatt-hour credit for power the turbine produces. The credit has been so important to the industry that on the two previous occasions that Congress has let it lapse, turbine orders have slumped the following year.

This year, Republican lawmakers in particular have been holding the wind credit hostage in the debate over Democratic efforts to levy heavier taxes on the oil industry. Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., was one critic who said it was time to unplug the 20-year-old federal tax subsidy to "big wind" if the Senate was going to put more taxes on oil production.

Having struck out in four tries at getting the wind credit through the Senate as an amendment, Udall and Bennet have joined with Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., and Iowa Sens. Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin, a Republican and Democrat, in drafting separate legislation on behalf of the wind credit. Congress then went on a two-week Easter recess.

But the drumbeat goes on.

"Vestas will make a decision concerning its U.S. manufacturing facilities later in the year based on the status of the (tax credit) and the outlook for the markets served by the U.S. factories," Vestas said last week.

Which is why Bennet repeated his commitment to getting the tax credit extended when he was visiting Grand Junction earlier this week.

If the drama seems one-sided, that's been the case. While six of the state's seven House members have endorsed extending the wind credit -- including Rep. Scott Tipton -- the Southern Colorado Republican has been in a holding pattern for Udall and Bennet to get the job done in the Senate.

Tipton has talked to House GOP leaders about the tax credit, but there hasn't been the same initiative among the House Republican majority to extend the wind credit or other business credits that are likely to expire this year without action.

Another issue is shortage of bills that are likely to get through the Democratic-majority Senate and the Republican-majority House, especially in an election year.

Sooner or later, both chambers have to approve legislation to keep the government operating for another year. The House approved four appropriation bills last year that were the vehicles to keep the federal government funded. Whether either chamber would consider attaching the wind credit or other business tax credits to a federal spending bill this year is uncertain.

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