Presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Clinton unveiled an agenda this week in Pittsburgh, Penn., that seeks to dole out $7 billion in tax benefits annually to encourage job creation. Why does the cleantech world care? Because of that money, a whopping $1 billion would be used to shore up federally funded cleantech R&D and the domestic manufacturing of clean energy goods.
Clinton’s calling it “insourcing” (as opposed to “outsourcing” our jobs overseas) and is advocating a “Made Green In America” fund that would invest $500 million annually to encourage the transition to a green economy.
Under this proposal, domestic facilities that manufacture qualifying clean energy technologies, such as wind and solar, or the components of such technologies, would be eligible to receive awards of up to 30 percent of the costs of engineering, retooling or construction of facilities to manufacture qualifying clean energy technologies.
She also laid out a Green Manufacturing Extension Program, which would provide a broad range of tools and technical assistance (read: a vague amount of funding) to small and medium-sized manufacturers with a focus on green energy.
The “Made Green In America” fund would invest in creating what the Clinton campaign is calling business “ecubators,” defined as: “small firms that are developing and testing early-stage ideas with the potential to transform our energy sources to be cleaner and more sustainable.” Apparently the Clinton campaign isn’t familiar with the term “cleantech startup” and felt the need to create “ecubators,” which sounds like a hippie hatchery.
In the face of mounting global competition, Clinton also wants the U.S. government to support emerging cleantech research and development. “Two decades ago, the U.S. offered the most generous R&D tax benefits in the world. Today, we have fallen to 17th – below even Mexico,” she is quoted as saying. Clinton says she will create 15 major research clusters using $500 million a year in tax-exempt bonds for states and local governments to build research parks. Her campaign says every federal dollar will leverage $2 in private equity to boost cleantech R&D.
As our Cleantech 101 map shows, clusters are already sprouting up around the country well outside of the venture capital-rich Bay Area. This money would definitely help them grow.
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