White House urges renewal of wind energy tax credits

Jul 2 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Leslie Brooks Suzukamo Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.

Congress needs to act quickly to extend a tax credit for the wind industry, potentially saving more than 37,000 jobs next year, including several hundred in Minnesota, a White House official visiting the Twin Cities says.

"Delaying action is creating uncertainty. Companies are scrapping or delaying plans to build new turbines," Nancy Sutley, chairwoman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said at a news conference Monday, July 2, under a giant wind turbine in North St. Paul.

The production tax credit was created in 1992 and gives wind farms a credit of 2.2 cents per kilowatt-hour of electricity produced. Since its inception, the tax credit has been extended seven times, but it has lapsed on occasion from inaction and it is scheduled to expire at the end of this year.

President Barack Obama supports the tax credit, as well as a 30 percent investment tax credit for manufacturers that invest in equipment to make components for U.S. clean energy projects.

Standing beneath the spinning blades of the 115-foot tall turbine owned by the Minnesota Municipal Power Association, Sutley said it would fairly simple for Congress to extend the tax credit.

"You saw the Transportation bill," she said, referring to the $120 billion legislation passed Friday by Congress, one day before road spending was set to run out.

"When Congress puts its mind to it, something can get done fairly quickly," Sutley said.

However, wind developers, engineering firms and

manufacturers already have cut staff over the uncertainty, industry representatives said at the conference.

The last time the production tax credit expired, installations of new projects dropped by 73 percent over the previous year, Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minneapolis, said at the news conference.

Leslie Brooks Suzukamo can be reached at 651-228-5475. Follow him at twitter.com/suzukamo.