October 05, 2011 02:36 AM UTC

Perlmutter Hits Back At GOP's Bizarro NREL Spin

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• by: Colorado Pols

You’ve already read about it, a typical gleeful spin job from the right-leaning Daily Caller:

President Barack Obama’s “green jobs” initiatives suffered another major blow late Monday, as the nonprofit National Renewable Energy Lab in Golden, Colorado, announced a plan to lay off roughly 10 percent of its staff through a voluntary buy-out plan.

According to the Denver Post, the lab plans to eliminate between 100 and 150 of its 1,350 jobs. The Obama administration supported the NREL in 2009 with roughly $200 million in stimulus grants. Energy Secretary Stephen Chu visited Golden in May 2009 to promote the NREL as a beneficiary of those funds…

NREL spokesman Bob Noun blames Congress for the organization’s failures. The Denver Post reports that he believes the gridlocked U.S. Congress forced the NREL to find $8 million in new budgetary savings.

“We don’t see any budget scenario where the lab doesn’t face budget cuts,” Noun said. “We just want to be proactive in managing the budget so we continue our core mission.”

Amy Oliver of Colorado’s conservative Independence Institute said one way to look at these potential “green jobs” shortcomings is that the NREL is exaggerating its claims…

The fact is, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory’s staff began to grow rapidly in 2007–that is, well before President Barack Obama and “teh stimulus”–and the reason NREL is buying out about 10% of their employees is their projection that the federal government won’t be able to pay them. A Congress itching to disparage renewable energy investment, and unable to pass actual budgets, isn’t going to be able to fund NREL at a level to sustain their current workforce.

We shouldn’t have to point out that NREL is not the only federal line-item being cut.

But backers of the nation’s premiere renewable energy research facility–and the thousands of jobs directly and indirectly attributable to its existence–will be pleased to know that NREL’s representative in Congress, Ed Perlmutter, is having none of it. His statement today:

“Over the last 270 days, Washington Republicans’ sole achievement is to ensure job reductions — not encourage job creation. [Pols emphasis] They want to to import oil and export jobs, and that is the wrong way to grow our economy and reduce our debt. Their reckless action of passing budgets six weeks at a time means NREL is forced to offer voluntary staff reductions at a time when we need to invest more in their innovative work to ensure our national economic security and energy independence. My number one priority is to get people back to work here in our country, because that’s the best thing we can do to pay our debt and move forward toward economic stability.  We will continue to fight to build and maintain good jobs at NREL and the more than 5,500 private and public sector jobs dependent upon the work and products from NREL employees.”

It’s a bit of a whiplash to see Republicans, who have been trying to cut NREL’s budget for years (witness Doug Lamborn’s recent ill-fated attempt), to now place blame on NREL, and by extension the Obama administration, for Republicans getting their way enough to force these job cuts. We assume that the Solyndra bankruptcy stuff has emboldened them some way: after all, even Lamborn blinked when the damage was represented to him in terms of job losses.

Who will regret these job losses more next year?