Wind Energy Jobs

Wind power supplies both affordable and clean energy to anyone willing to tap into it. Since wind generation has recently become affordable and both business and government sources are turning to alternative energy, the job market for wind energy jobs is going to increase exponentially in the near future.

According to the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA), since the cost of wind generated electricity has dropped in recent times by almost 80 percent, the market has become competitive with fossil fuels and jobs are listing daily.

Currently, the wind industry directly employs over 2000 people across 46 states. It is currently estimated that about three-fourths of the states in the United States have enough area and wind assets to be a commercial generator of electricity.

If even half of this were utilized, literally thousands of wind energy jobs would be created. In fact, the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) estimates that every megawatt of installed wind capacity creates roughly 60 person-years of employment and 15 to 19 jobs.

What kind of jobs does the wind industry create? In the beginning a wind system will need to be created. The products needed to create wind energy systems have to be manufactured.

The manufacturing process creates careers in the area of country where jobs are needed the most. Manufacturing positions involved everything from assembly line workers to plant administrators.

Once the parts are made and kits are issued, installation staff is needed to install the new wind energy systems. These wind energy jobs include supervisors and installation technicians along with electricians to tie the wind system into household or business electrical lines.

And, once the windmills are installed, maintenance staff is needed to keep the energy systems running smoothly. So the answer to the original question about what kind of jobs is a full line of manufacturing and maintenance staff.

Another huge advantage of wind jobs is that it keeps jobs and money in the local community. Money from wind energy does not support the large oil companies and does not go toward purchasing overseas oil.

In addition, since most of the big companies do not have large parcels of land to place wind farms, landowners and farmers often benefit from leasing arrangements and make a substantial income. Currently, lease prices vary, but on average a single utility-scale turbine is about 2000 dollars a year in income.

In larger scale operations, for example a 250 acre farm, with a lease agreement of 55 dollars per acre, the annual income for a farmer would be 14000 dollars only leasing 2 acres. Right now in the United States, farmers are welcoming large scale wind energy generation units because of failing oil wells.

A significant number of oil wells in the United States are currently in third stage recovery, which means that producing oil from them is very expensive and most farmers choose to just fill them in.

In the past oil was the best investment, but that is currently being tipped in favor of wind energy. For example, in Lake Benton, Minnesota, 143 wind turbines were installed in early 1998. This project was an overall 250 million dollar investment and, once installed, supported 10 full time decent paying jobs.

Wind energy systems also create secondary wind energy jobs for local communities. Alameda County, California, provides one of the best examples of this statement. In 1998, the county collected 725000 dollars in property taxes during 1998 from wind turbine installations valued at 66 million dollars.

Another example is seen in Iowa where a recent study found that Iowa’s utility customers could save over $300 million over a 25-year period of time if only 10% of the state’s electricity was generated by wind power. In all of these examples, cities and counties benefited greatly from the inclusion of wind energy.

The money earned and saved can be reinvested into the local economy creating infrastructure positions, county positions, and forward civic projects. The inclusion of these indirect jobs can be a stimulus to the local economy.

Overall, using wind power creates local jobs and boosts farm incomes without polluting the air and water, protecting both people and the environment. Wind can provide the long-term economic growth needed following the recent economic recession.

Finding a wind job is easy as the AWEA and many others currently have online job sites where both employers and employees can list positions and resumes. This is a growing industry and could possibly be the solution to all of the people who lost jobs in the manufacturing and vehicle industry.