Investigative Reporter Russ Choma
We caught up with investigative journalist Russ Choma for a quick chat about his latest article tracking where the green stimulus dollars are ending up. The story is part of the Investigative Reporting Workshop’s ongoing series, “Blown Away: America’s billions for clean-energy jobs are flying overseas.” Choma’s latest article was reported in coordination with ABC’s World News Tonight with Diane Sawyer and the Watchdog Institute, a non-profit investigative journalism group based at San Diego State University.
Green Energy Reporter: This is the second installment in your ongoing Blown Away series for the Investigative Reporting Workshop, how did you get interested in this story?
Russ Choma: Last year I was reporting on infrastructure investments for a trade publication in Washington and in doing that got interested in the renewable energy industry and its use of stimulus dollars. In my daily reporting, I realized that foreign renewable energy companies were getting a majority of the stimulus dollars. Not only that, but that these taxpayer dollars were not even going to any U.S. subsidiary but largely supporting overseas workers.
GER: Yes. On the overseas jobs: In your article, you write that a lot of the stimulus-funded cash grants have actually ended up financing jobs in Europe or Asia. Can you give us some specific examples?
RC: Sure. One project we tracked was the Meadow Lake Wind Farm in Indiana, developed by Horizon Wind, the U.S. subsidiary of EPD Renewables, which is a Portuguese company. Meadow Lake uses Vestas wind turbines that were likely made in Denmark, where Vestas is from. The massive steel towers supporting these Vestas turbines were not U.S.-made but actually manufactured in Vietnam by a company called CS Wind. We found that out because we tracked the bill of lading, listing the ship and the cargo issued by the ship, and it clearly stated that these towers were headed to Meadow Lake in Indiana.
GER: But does the government have a choice? Could U.S. companies alone absorb the billions of dollars in stimulus money?
RC: Well, if all along the point of this stimulus was to erect wind turbines or deploy more solar panels across the U.S., then yes, it would be money well spent. But from the beginning, the stimulus was sold as a job-creation machine. So, we have to ask ourselves: Is the stimulus building a clean energy industry, or is it financing offshore industries in Asia and Europe that are in effect building this industry for us? So far, most of the jobs created by the stimulus are short-term and are found at the end of the renewable energy value chain. They are construction jobs to erect and place the steel towers or PVs, and maintenance jobs. The long-term, well-paid jobs are overseas and, have, over the past year partly been supported by U.S. taxpayer money.
GER: So, how do we ensure more stimulus money stays in the U.S.?
RC: Well, first of all, as an investigative reporter, in doing this piece my mission wasn’t to find and endorse a solution, but to report on potential fixes to this problem. As part of my reporting, I did talk to plenty of people who had ideas. Many of my sources proposed tweaking the direct cash grants so that it incentivizes job creation and is not just a financial hand out. That’s what something like the manufacturing tax credit does and it’s been very successful. Application from U.S.-based manufacturers for the tax credit last year peaked at around $7 billion. That’s more than double what had been expected. If anything, something like the manufacturing tax credit shows that this country has the skills and capacity to make things like wind towers, turbines or blades.