Action 8: Expand Renewable Energy Capabilities
Leverage Renewal Energy Fund and Deepwater Wind Project
A new national focus on confronting climate change and reducing our nation’s dependence on imported oil and expensive fossil fuels have caused renewable energy to emerge as an outstanding innovation-economy job growth opportunity — one that stands out against the prevailing dark economic news. Our coastal location’s renewable energy resources, our state’s commitment to energy efficiency, and our wealth of "green tech" talent give Rhode Island enormous potential to become the epicenter of the emerging alternative energy market. It is a clear example of how Rhode Island must move quickly and nimbly to seize such opportunities.
In 2008, the Rhode Island General Assembly gave the RIEDC the duty of managing the state’s Renewable Energy Fund (REF), which provides grants and loans to renewable energy projects that generate electricity in a cleaner, more sustainable manner. The law requires specific fund allocations for municipal projects and for non-profit affordable housing projects. The broad range of potential projects includes wind energy, solar energy, ocean energy, geothermal energy, small hydro-energy projects, eligible bio-mass energy, and fuel cells.
In 2009, the RIEDC will manage the REF to build a competitive "green sector" of the Rhode Island economy, attract green businesses to Rhode Island, create a green workforce, and increase the number of "green collar" jobs in the state. The RIEDC will leverage the REF to get federal stimulus funding to develop the renewable energy sector and projects. RIEDC is committed to supporting both small, community-scale projects and large, utility-scale ones. As an example of the type of projects the REF can fund, on January 2009, the REF awarded $30,000 in grant funds — to the Town of Jamestown’s wind power feasibility study.
RIEDC will also leverage the Deepwater Wind project to create more "green sector" jobs in the state. The Deepwater Wind energy project off the coast of Rhode Island is slated to provide 1.3 million megawatt hours per year of renewable energy — 15 percent of the state’s electricity demand – and create more than 800 new jobs at Quonset Business Park. By establishing itself as an early leader in large-scale offshore wind energy production, Rhode Island will gain an important competitive advantage in attracting alternative energy companies to the state and in creating new, high-wage, green energy jobs.