During a discussion about presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s recent climate announcement on the July 15 edition of Fox News’ Outnumbered, Fox Business host Charles Payne made a very disingenuous statement that “so-called clean energy jobs are just a farce.”
This statement is utterly detached from reality, where clean energy jobs have skyrocketed over the past several years. A recent report from the environmental nonprofit E2 calculated that there were 3.3 million clean energy jobs in the U.S. at the start of 2020, accounting for “more than 40 percent of America’s entire energy workforce.” The 2019 version of this study found that clean energy jobs already “outnumber fossil fuels jobs nearly three to one (3.26M to 1.17M).” And as more and more states and electric utilities set clean energy goals, this will only create more demand for clean energy jobs. Indeed, one recent study from the University of California, Berkeley, shows that it is possible to power the U.S. with 90% clean energy by 2035 without higher consumer costs -- if this proposal is implemented, the study also indicates it would “increase energy sector jobs by up to 530,000 per year through 2035.”
Although the industry has taken a hit from the coronavirus pandemic, this is true of nearly every other major industry as well. But data released this week shows that governments are disproportionately aiding fossil fuels over clean energy sources in pandemic stimulus packages. In the U.S., the fossil fuel industry has gotten more than double what clean energy has received.