Among the many things the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) did was invest a large amount of money across the country in sectors that were seen as forward-looking or fulfilling maintenance needs. One of those sectors was clean-energy, where in Georgia alone there were 51 projects that have already begun or are in the process of starting. These projects total up to nearly $28 billion in funding, much of it in rural areas across the state. Those 51 projects were slated to create approximately 42,000 jobs across the state.
Among the many things Congressional Republicans are doing, is repealing parts of the Biden administration’s policy that they find wasteful or ideologically partisan in nature. Republicans are currently debating strategies for the upcoming “big bill” and repealing the IRA’s Clean Energy Tax Credits may be on the chopping block.
Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock has just released a report that aims to defend these tax credits and the clean energy economy in general. The report notes that much of the funding for these new projects is in areas outside of the Atlanta region, with 70 percent of the new investments and 83 percent of new jobs are in counties with median family incomes below the national median. More than 95 percent of the jobs and investments are in countries where the percentage of people with a bachelor’s degree is below the national average.
“I‘m here in my hometown of Savannah, Georgia to speak out about efforts to eliminate up to 42,000 good-paying jobs right here in Georgia. That includes 7,400 jobs right here,” said Senator Raphael Warnock. “Now it’s up to Georgia’s congressional Republicans to protect these clean energy credits,” Warnock said. “Let’s choose the people over politics. Let’s choose jobs over the games that so often get played in Washington, D.C. Let’s protect these jobs and protect these investments.”
One of the companies that has benefited from the IRA incentives is solar panel manufacturer QCells. The solar panel maker was hailed by Marjorie Taylor Green as “fantastic” upon their announcement that they would be investing more than $2.5 billion in Georgia. “The Inflation Reduction Act contains some of the most ambitious clean energy manufacturing policies enacted anywhere in the world. The Inflation Reduction Act is not just going to help decarbonize the grid, it’s going to ensure that we are not dependent on imports to do it. And in the process it’s going to create thousands of good-paying, high-quality, high-tech manufacturing jobs across the United States,” said Scott Moskowitz, Director of U.S. Strategy at Qcells.
You can read the full report from Senator Warnock’s office here:
Supercharged: Georgia’s Clean Energy Boom After the Inflation Reduction Act
