‘Green jobs’ farm in Colorado sheds jobs after receiving $200M in stimulus funds

The Daily Caller ^ | 10/04/2011 | Matthew Boyle

[martosko]

President Barack Obama’s “green jobs” initiatives suffered another major blow late Monday, as the nonprofit National Renewable Energy Lab in Golden, Colorado, announced a plan to lay off roughly 10 percent of its staff through a voluntary buy-out plan.

According to the Denver Post, the lab plans to eliminate between 100 and 150 of its 1,350 jobs. The Obama administration supported the NREL in 2009 with roughly $200 million in stimulus grants. Energy Secretary Stephen Chu visited Golden in May 2009 to promote the NREL as a beneficiary of those funds.

[DTogo]

Oliver also suggested that the NREL layoffs may indicate another failure of the Obama administration’s “green jobs” agenda. Candidate Obama pledged in 2008 that he would add 5 million green jobs to the economy, but Republican lawmakers in Washington, D.C. now say the White House has stretched what it defines as a “green job” in order to pad its numbers.

Ask anyone (honest) in the renewable energy industry and they will tell you that it is a low man-hour industry:

- no jobs required to make the wind blow
- no jobs required to make the sun shine

D'uh, winning!

[Don Corleone]

These recycling slush funds are criminal! Government money is being recycled into Obama campaign coffers. He bragged about how big a campaign chest he would have. He never mentioned that it would be taxpayers money.

[sten]

if i promise not to hire anyone... can i get $50m?