Two years ago, wind power was more of a going concern. Suzlon wind turbine blades that were each 150 feet long were moved into position for delivery to a new wind farm in Fort Bridger, Wyo.

We need more renewable energy, not less!  That’s why this is the saddest renewable energy story this year, and a cautionary tale of politics gone wrong.  Our government should be helping subsidize renewable energy like wind and solar, but apparently, that’s over with.  Or is the problem the “market”?  Our regional coal plants continue bellowing pollution and mercury because coal remains cheap to buy and use. Then today it was reported that this  factory is closing December 29th.

There will be no “next year” for this wind turbine plant.  It’s shutting down, and along with it goes hundreds of real and potential jobs.  At it’s peak, this green business employed 500 people.  Just think — 500 renewable energy green jobs, and now they’ll be gone.  Today there were two stories about this in the Star Tribune.  The first, the sad ending of a Minnesotan wind turbine plant.

Wind-turbine maker Suzlon Group will idle its Pipestone, Minn., plant, putting 110 workers out of jobs, because the once-booming U.S. wind energy market has lost headway.

The layoffs, to take effect Dec. 29, were announced Monday, the same day Suzlon, the world’s No. 3 wind energy company, reported a 70 percent drop in U.S. wind turbine installations for the first half of the year. It follows other industry reports of a deep downturn in the U.S. wind market.

Suzlon, headquartered in India, invested $8.5 million four years ago to open its first U.S. blade-making factory in the heart of southwestern Minnesota’s wind-power alley. The company took advantage of government offers of free land and JOBZ tax breaks. Factory employment, once at 500 workers, had declined to 143 before Monday’s layoff announcement.  Read more here.

The government can encourage renewable energy, or it can let the “market” determine our energy future and our response to climate change.  The market should not be deciding something so critically important.  The problem is that the U.S. has no energy policy.

It’s time to decide which way the wind is blowing

On the same day that Suzlon Group decided to shut its wind turbine blade plant in Pipestone, Minn., city officials in Jonesboro, Ark., were glowing from Friday’s grand opening of a $40 million wind turbine manufacturing plant by Denmark-based Nordex. And now many of those green jobs are in Denmark. In part, this is due to the fact that Republicans deny science, don’t believe in climate change, and feel that renewable energy should take a backseat to coal and oil.

This is a recipe for disaster, and despite Jon Stewart pleading with us all to be “sane”, there is no way to overstate the threat of climate change to our world.

Europe gets about 5 percent of its energy from wind, and in some countries the total is 10 [...]