Fact Sheet | Jobs from Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency (2008)

October 22, 2008

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According to research by Roger Bezdek for the American Solar Energy Society (ASES), the renewable energy (RE) and energy efficiency (EE) industries created a total of 8.5 million jobs (direct and indirect) in 2006; 450,000 jobs in RE and 8 million jobs in EE throughout the United States. As many as 1 out of 4 workers in the United States will be working in RE or EE industries by 2030. The 40 million jobs are not just engineering‐related, but also include millions of new jobs in manufacturing, construction, accounting, and management.
The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) estimates that a national Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) of 20% by 2020 would create 185,000 new jobs from RE development, add $25.6 billion in income to farmers, ranchers, and rural landowners and save consumers $10.5 billion in lower electricity and natural gas bills by 2020.
A report from the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory in Berkeley found that RE creates more jobs per megawatt (MW) of power installed, per unit of energy produced, and per dollar of investment, than the fossil fuel energy-based sector.