New York City has a plan to create 13,000 green jobs over the next 10 years, in part by retraining laid-off workers from the finance industry to build the city’s future in carbon trading.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced a comprehensive plan to grow New York City’s green economy. The 30 initiatives that comprise the plan aim to support and attract green businesses and entrepreneurs and provide specialized training to prepare New Yorkers for green jobs.
One of the initiatives, Green JumpStart NYC, is a training program to assist displaced or entrepreneurial junior to mid-level employees in exploring opportunities in carbon trading and related green finance jobs. The program will be run by SUNY’s Levin Institute and offer a training “boot camp,” after which participants will be offered a 10-week unpaid fellowship with a green company with the potential of converting to full-time employment. The first class will begin in early 2010.
The full set of 30 initiatives targets specific areas for 70% of green sector jobs in the City over the next decade: green buildings, onsite renewable energy, carbon trading and finance, and greener neighborhoods.
The City is investing more than $7.5 million to implement the initiatives while also leveraging existing City, State and federal stimulus funds.
“We hear a lot about the potential of green jobs as a driver of future economic growth, but often the rhetoric is not matched with a real plan to capitalize on opportunities,” Bloomberg said. “The initiatives we’re announcing today will take advantage of the progressive sustainability practices we continue to put in place in New York City, and will create real green jobs by attracting and growing green businesses and helping the City’s workforce be prepared to meet the demand for green skill-specific jobs.”
Highlights of the initiatives include:
-Develop Urban Technology Innovation Center: To address the lack of a major green technology research and development center, the City will partner with an academic institution or NGO to develop an Urban Technology Innovation Center. The Center will drive the creation of new technologies, promote the City as a testing platform for these technologies, and create an inventory of building technology development and deployment projects to share benchmarking data and best practices among building owners. In November, NYCEDC will release a Request for Proposals to select a partner to develop the Center, which is expected to open in 2010.
-Establish “Solar Zones” to Encourage Expanded Solar PV Installations: As part of the Solar America Cities partnership, the City was awarded $1 million from the Department of Energy funding to establish several “solar zones,” which will facilitate solar installations in targeted areas by streamlining the permitting process, establishing an ombudsman to oversee implementation, and launching a one-stop website with mapping and incentive information. This proposal builds off a federally-funded study on the Con Edison grid that identified areas of the City that have desirable energy use patterns and adequate roof space.
-Launch Solar Thermal Grant Program: A study funded by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) identified New York City as the “most favorable” location in NY State for solar thermal systems for hot water and space heating. Despite the fact that solar thermal tends to have a shorter payback period than other renewable energy technologies, there remains a lack of awareness, financial incentives, and regulatory clarity in regard to solar thermal technology.
To provide a substantial boost to the number of solar thermal projects in NYC, the City will launch a $1 million pilot project to leverage federal funding (30% tax credit) and private capital (30% cost share). The project could lead to $3-$5 million in solar thermal projects in the next three years. Applications for funding are now available at www.nycedc.com/solarthermal.
Project installations are expected to begin in early 2010. The NYCEDC-funded projects will also include monitoring equipment so that NYCEDC can study the performance of the systems installed to better understand the financial, technical, and regulatory barriers that must be overcome to foster a sustainable and robust marketplace for solar thermal systems in New York City.
-Launch Urban Wind Demonstration Project: Of the 64 submissions to a Request for Expressions of Interest on renewable energy projects in NYC released last year, nearly one-third were for building-sited wind projects. The City has responded by establishing a permitting process that, in the absence of national safety standards, will allow for the installation of small wind turbines.
The City is also launching an Urban Wind Demonstration, which will provide nominal funding and permitting assistance and help identify building sites to qualified small wind turbine manufacturers. The Demonstration will test the performance and safety of small wind turbine systems installed in a dense urban setting and is expected to launch in Fall 2009. Several wind turbine manufacturers foresee a market for 5,000 to 10,000 installations in New York City over the next decade.
-Launch Green Incentives Guide: Sources of funding available to green businesses are diverse and change frequently, making it difficult for companies to identify and understand all opportunities available to them. To assist businesses, the City has updated www.nycedc.com/incentives to include information on funding and incentives available for green businesses.
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