In early February, the union produced a draft of a bill that would ask developers like Equinor to buy their wind equipment from manufacturers in New York State “to the maximum extent feasible” — not just towers but other components, like blades and nacelles, which house the mechanical guts of a turbine. Ms. Fahy, a member of the Assembly, and State Senator Neil Breslin, a fellow Democrat from the Albany area, signed on as sponsors.
Environmentalists and industry officials quickly raised concerns that the measure could discourage developers from coming to the state.
“So far, Equinor has gone above and beyond what any other company has done,” said Lisa Dix, who led the Sierra Club’s campaign for renewable energy in New York until recently. “Why do we need more onerous requirements on companies given what we got?”
Ms. Dix and other clean-energy advocates had worked with labor unions to persuade the state that construction jobs in offshore wind should offer union-scale wages and representation. And New York’s system for evaluating clean-energy bids already awarded points to developers that promised local economic benefits.
Ms. Reynolds, the head of the environmental and industry coalition in New York, worried that going beyond the existing arrangement could make the cost of renewable energy unsustainable.
“If it became bigger and more noticeable on electric bills, the common expectation is that political support for New York’s clean-energy programs would erode,” she said.
The communications workers sought to offer reassurance, not entirely successfully. “I said to them, ‘We’re trade unionists: We ask for everything, the boss offers us nothing, and then we make a deal,’” Mr. Master said. “‘But I do think there’s no reason why turbines should be coming from France as opposed to Schenectady.’”
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/11/business/economy/clean-energy-biden.html
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