Ritter signs historic renewable energy bill, increasing standard to 30% by 2020
Legislation will create thousands of new jobs and require nearly one-third of Colorado’s electricity come from sustainable renewable energy sources
Gov. Bill Ritter today signed into law landmark legislation that gives Colorado the highest renewable energy standard in the Rocky Mountain West, requiring that 30 percent of electricity be generated from renewable sources by 2020.
House Bill 10-1001 – sponsored by Rep. Max Tyler and Sens. Gail Schwartz and Bruce Whitehead – will create thousands of new jobs, lead to 100,000 solar rooftops over the next decade, and help protect consumers and ratepayers.
“Today we continue to chart a new course for Colorado’s New Energy Economy and America’s clean energy economy,” Gov. Ritter said, signing the bill at SolSource Inc., a Denver-based solar installation company. “Colorado is giving every state and the entire nation a template for tomorrow. This is a game-changer. We are transforming the future of Colorado and our country.”
Gov. Ritter also thanked Excel Energy for its continued leadership and partnership in building Colorado’s New Energy Economy.
In 2004, Coloradans passed Amendment 37, which set the country’s first voter-approved renewable energy requirement at 10 percent by 2015. In 2007, Gov. Ritter and the legislature doubled the requirement to 20 percent by 2020. Twenty-nine states now have renewable energy requirements.
The 30 percent requirement in HB 1001 is the best in the Rocky Mountain West and among the highest nationally.
HB 10-1001 also calls for 3 percent of the standard to be met by local solar power. This solar distributed generation will encourage clean, renewable local power without expensive new transmission lines to be built and create thousands of Colorado jobs.
“With HB 1001 we will manufacture and install panels and turbines all over Colorado to capture free energy,” said Rep. Tyler said. “The sun will always shine for free, the winds will always blow for free, and our energy production will be cleaner. Renewable energy, green jobs, and a cleaner future — what’s not to like?”
“It was extremely gratifying to sponsor HB 1001,” Sen. Schwartz said. “I have been a strong advocate for renewable energy throughout my career because I see the advantages it brings to Colorado. This bill will attract hundreds of companies, create thousands of jobs, and ensure these are the kind of companies and the kind of jobs that will build Colorado’s economy for years to come. HB 1001 will create a diverse portfolio of energy resources to keep energy affordable in the long term, and keep Colorado leading the country in renewable energy and economic recovery.”
“Encouraging green energy in Colorado is not only an investment in the beauty and health of our state but also in our economy,” Sen. Whitehead said. “Renewable energy will create thousands of jobs for Coloradans and get our state back to work. We have attracted over 230 solar companies to our state already, and passing HB 1001 to increase our renewable energy standards will only continue this trend.”
“Today we’ve truly hit it out of the park, taking Colorado’s vision for a new energy future to the big leagues,” said Pam Kiely program director with Environment Colorado. “Over four short years we’ve tripled our commitment to renewable energy, and by taking a bold swing at the time when our energy challenges are the most profound we’ve proven to the nation that Colorado can step up to the plate and deliver.”
“This bill will boost the New Energy Economy and grow Colorado’s renewable energy markets,” said Mary Broderick, renewable energy and marketing agent with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 68, which will help train a new generation of solar installers. “This new law will provide safe, quality photovoltaic installations and create green careers for Colorado’s working families.”
“We view House Bill 1001 as an significant step forward in helping Coloradans achieve greater access to clean energy sources like solar and wind,” said Jeff Scott, founder and president of SolSource Inc., a leading solar energy engineering, procurement and construction firm based in Denver. “As a longtime supporter of renewable energy, we are very proud to operate a solar energy business in Colorado, a state that is known for its abundant natural resources and talented workforce. We will be training and employing 20 to 30 new people in the next 30 days and see today’s signing by Gov. Ritter as a commitment to supporting Colorado clean tech jobs.”
Well by 2020 we will probably be paying much more for a kilowatt and having brownouts and blackouts on par with Baghdad.
But hey, that global warming will be on the run!
What a bunch of crap. Let’s replace all these enviro-green-based-on-peer-evaluated-phony science with a bunch of normal Republicans and get on with life.
geneo,
As always you are mad at people that can know how to spend the money. So the spending is made to make us the best and obama and ritter are not afraid to spend to make it better still. And finally ritter has learned that he needs to spend and not be stingy liek yellow livered week ones. Dont you see that if we do not spend we wil lfall liek rome as they did t not spend enough and had to many freedoms. During those rome days they wre lost in wars becasue they did not get health care and postalcare to all the race peopel. And do not forget that that is obama will stop. You see it is real simple that the kiaser of prussia did nto know how o spend enough to help those race people.
art
Arto,
It never ceases to amaze me how your liberalDemocrats can convince people to pay them taxes. Most times it revolves around how much you are getting back in return, or how much you ‘feel’ you are helping other people, I guess. It is a heck of a sales job. This scam on renewable energy is really creative. Make people feel they can save cute animals and the sky by merely doing dumb little things and paying big taxes. The start teaching it in school now. The little kids get mad at mommy is she doesn’t put the milk carton in the right recycle bin. The energy – green job – sky is falling – the water is dirty – and now even you will not stay well unless you have the government looking after you. It creeps me out. I say let us live free and stay out of our lives. “Ritter” reminds me of the drill and white china dish the dentist used to have to spit blood into. That was the brand name of the torture equipment. It is a sad day when more and more people are dumb enough to buy into the Democrat torture machine. Where are the 1776 patriots? . . They may be coming back. If enough people can find out the real news and not just eat the crap fed to them by the criminlLiberalPress and the Democrat Party, maybe we can have new patriots. We are at a crossroads. We need to through off the yoke of liberal repression. I do not want to be Obama’s slave. That is what he wants. Let him try to get me to pay for everyone else’s health services. Let him try to make be go blind using dim light bulbs. I AM READY FOR A ANOTHER REVOLUTION. The redneck tree hugger logger in Aspen is right.
. . . throw off the yoke of liberal repression . . . even the ‘payback’ on green jobs is phony . . . look at the precious European data . . Obama is only smart in that he can con people and lie to them to their face . . . he tells people their health care will go down $2,500 / year and Mary is willing to pay more . . . they are outlawing light bulbs so they can sell us new bulbs with mercury in them which they just got done telling us would kill us . . . Al Gore is getting rich selling phony paper credits for not using carbon. . . Obama wants you to stop smoking and he and M. E. Sprenglemeyer still smoke . . they want you not to eat anything to get fat and they eat Kobe Beef, well not Sprenglemeyer. . . liberals want to outlaw salt . . they want to make marijuana a health item that I will have to pay for . . . you say silly? . . they want to make me buy a product I don’t want to buy . . all so a lot of dumb and stoned people will vote D. . . if they can remember to without ACORN hauling them to the polls and moving writing the ‘X’ for them on the ballot. They have their impeached judge Rep. AlceeeHastings lecturing me on how ‘rules’ for voting mean nothing. . . they think we are stupid. . .
geneo,
Taxes is what keeps the usa so great. Every one knows that we have to spend more money to be the best and usa people are glad to help to be best. And we saw that rome went down becasue thhe peopel did nto pay enough taxes. Pleas take a look at that lily livered w bush and how he did not spend enough. And now we see that obama is not scared of having the peopel pay more taxes. Right winged nuts are the oens that do not pay taxes to help the common man all of obama and his workers are happy to pay all the taxes. This is what he promosed in his election words and you can see it happen. You just have to see that all taxes are the wisest spent and none is wasted or used for bad ways.
art
Did you misspell again? . . “Texas is what keeps the U.S.A. so great.”
well geneo,
you can see it is texas where the economy is good and people are glad to pay the taxes to help obamacare. those texans just may be the first with postofficecare.
Ed Stein’s and you probably have dyslexia,
and think the saying is . . DON’T MESS WITH TAXES !