The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently held a webinar discussing the benefits that arise out of the clean energy economy and the ways in which these “metrics of success” might be estimated. Denise Mulholland, Senior Program Manager at the EPA D.C. headquarters, stressed two particular economic benefits of clean energy initiatives: 1) long-term savings from increased energy efficiency and 2) job creation in sectors directly tied to implementation of initiatives. The resultant cost savings and job market growth signify increased cash flow into the economy.

The panelists examined three separate methods for estimating these economic benefits. Marc Breslow, Massachusetts Director of Transportation and Buildings Policy, described an input-output model that inputs an industry’s production and then measures the effect that production has on other industries, consumers, the government and foreign suppliers. Using this method, he examined the effect on the Massachusetts economy of its energy efficiency initiatives for buildings and transportation. Breslow found that by 2020, Massachusetts would save over $6 billion in energy costs and create 36,000 new green jobs through its energy efficiency initiatives.

Karl Michael, Project Manager at the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, discussed the Econometric Approach as another method for estimating economic benefits tied to clean energy initiatives. The Econometric Approach is an input-output model that takes into account responses to economic factors over time, similar to the input-output model Breslow described, but also taking price inflation, deflation, and other cost dynamics into account. Michael used the econometric method to estimate the net cumulative job years New York energy initiatives would produce, estimating about 69,100 new job years by 2024. A job year is defined as one job sustained for one year. Multiple job years can either be calculated as multiple jobs per year or one job sustained through multiple years.

Suzanne Tegen, Market and Policy Impact Analysis Group in the Strategic Energy Analysis Center of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), discussed the use of the Jobs and Economic Development Impact (JEDI) model to project potential jobs and cost benefits from a Wyoming wind project. Applying the JEDI model, Tegen found that the project would produce over 1,700 new long-term jobs and save over $1.2 billion in energy costs by 2022.

In the EPA’s full report, Assessing the Multiple Benefits of Clean Energy, it is stressed that:

States have historically evaluated clean energy policies based predominantly on their costs and impacts on energy demand. However, by considering and estimating the multiple energy system, environmental, and economic benefits of clean energy as they design and select clean energy policies and programs, states can more fully understand the range of costs and benefits of these potential actions.

In a first-of-its-kind report, the Brookings Institution has released “Sizing the Clean Economy: A National and Regional Green Jobs Assessment”, measuring growth in the clean economy in all 50 states and the nation’s largest 100 metropolitan areas. The San Jose Mercury News explains how the Brookings Institution defines “clean jobs”:

The Brookings Institution adopted a definition of clean jobs that includes five main categories: renewable energy, energy and resource efficiency, greenhouse gas reduction, environmental management and recycling, agriculture and natural resource conservation, and regulation and compliance.

The report indicates that California has the highest number of clean jobs with 318,156 – making  up 2.1 percent of all jobs in the state – and the Bay Area continues to lead the nation in clean tech jobs. San Jose has more than doubled its number of cleantech jobs since 2003, up from 2,705 to 6,192 in 2010. The San Jose and San Francisco metro areas together have generated nearly 8,000 new clean jobs in the past seven years. Bay Area companies such as Bloom Energy, Silver Spring Networks, and Sungevity continue to add new cleantech jobs in spite of the recession.

"The combined Bay Area is an incredible clean economy and cleantech pole," said Mark Muro, a senior fellow and policy director at Brookings' Metropolitan Policy Program. "Cleantech is a newer and faster-growing subset of the overall clean economy.

The private sector has been getting serious about solar investment. Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, Prologis, and NRG just announced a partnership that aims to finance up to $2.6 billion of commercial and industrial rooftop solar arrays. Once finalized, the partnership will represent the largest distributed solar deal in history.

Through this distributed solar project, more than 10,000 full-year jobs will be generated across 28 states. After completion, these installations are estimated to supply about 733 MW of distributed solar energy, which would provide renewable energy to power roughly 100,000 homes.

Bank of America, a major partner of the Bay Area Climate Collaborative, will serve as the main financial backer of this project, supported by a US Department of Energy loan guarantee and $1.4 billion loan commitment. Prologis, an industrial real-estate owner, will serve as a developer and program sponsor by providing access to rooftops while making an equity investment in the project. NRG, one of the nation’s largest utility companies, is funding the first phase of the project as well as providing development resources. Together, they hope to produce large amounts of clean energy while generating thousands of jobs across the states.

This news follows closely on the heels of a similar announcement from Google, which is targeting residential solar. Further solidifying its emergence as a major, VC-level investor in clean power projects, Google has recently announced that it is creating a $280 million fund for rooftop solar panel projects to be installed by SolarCity, a sponsor of the Bay Area Climate Collaborative’s SunShares outreach program. Having previously invested in large-scale wind and solar thermal projects, this is Google’s first foray into residential and distributed solar.

SolarCity has raised at least a dozen funds similar to the Google one, but it usually raises these funds from banks like Citi and U.S. Bancorp (and has also worked with utility PG&E). Lyndon Rive, SolarCity CEO, said the biggest hurdle to getting its solar projects deployed is raising project financing.

According to the California solar Initiative (CSI), there are approximately 48,000 residential solar systems currently installed in the state. The Google SolarCity investment could have significant impacts on the number of installed residential solar in California and the nation.

Google’s $280 million fund could help deploy between 7,000 and 9,000 rooftop solar projects depending on the size of the systems, said Rive, in an interview this week. Because there are so few solar rooftop projects in the U.S. right now, the fund could theoretically help deploy one in 10 solar rooftop projects over the next two years, said Google Director of Green Business Operations Rick Needham.

Private sector investments of this kind can play a significant role in helping solar providers get projects deployed. Lyndon Rive, the CEO of SolarCity, says that “Google is setting an example that other leading American companies can follow.”

While jobs in clean energy and sustainability have shown growth even in the face of the downturn (update: see below) more growth is possible.  The weakness of the economy continues to dominate the entire jobs picture.  The East Bay Express writes:

Cities, states, and the federal government have spent billions in the past few years trying to create green jobs and train workers for them. But the foreclosure crisis and the continuing economic downturn have resulted in far fewer green jobs than politicians and environmentalists had hoped. Moreover, many of the jobs available have been snatched up by highly skilled, blue-collar workers sidelined by the housing collapse, leaving less-experienced trainees still unemployed.

UC Berkeley completed a study which lays out the opportunities and challenges:

The study, "Projecting Future Labor Demand and Supply in Energy Efficiency, Distributed Generation, and Demand Response in the Context of California's Jobless Recovery," estimated that the state will produce more than 211,000 new green jobs this decade. The report also noted that there were 14,248 more green jobs in 2010 in California than in 2009. But most of those jobs were grabbed by unemployed construction workers, while recent graduates of the state's 550-plus green jobs training programs have had trouble even scoring interviews.

The Express articles highlights some of the success stories and notes the varied definitions - from "green collar" jobs to a broader array:

Environmentally conscious companies that are not normally viewed as providing green jobs actually are doing so, they argue. This expanded view, for example, would consider a business, restaurant, or market that sells locally grown, sustainable food to be a "green" business with green jobs.

Update: Next 10 released its 2011 "Many Shades of Green" update, a follow on to its 2009 report with an update, the San Jose Mercury writes:

California's "Core Green Economy" had 174,000 jobs in January 2009, up from 169,000 in January 2008, according to the report by Next 10, a nonpartisan think tank founded by philanthropist and venture capitalist Noel Perry.

The Bay Area -- a hub for solar manufacturing and other clean energy generation -- continued to post the state's strongest green employment gains, adding 2,500 jobs -- half of the 5,000 statewide -- during the January 2008 to January 2009 time frame.

The bulk of the state's green jobs are in services, such as environmental consulting and green marketing. But manufacturing represents 26 percent of all green employment -- a significant share, given that manufacturing represents just 11 percent of the state's total economy.

The growth amid the downturn is noteworthy (from the report):

While statewide green employment increased three percent between January 2008 and 2009, both the Bay Area and the
San Diego Region exceeded this rate with employment gains of eight percent and seven percent respectively over the
twelve months.

And the overall scale of the green economy is larger than many realize:

In 2009, California’s Employment Development Department (EDD) completed a survey of nearly 15,200 employers in order to estimate the number of green jobs in the state, the variety of green occupations, and their distribution across the state’s economy. This survey concluded that more than 263,000 people spend at least half their time on the job focused on the production of green products or services. Another
170,000 jobs are held by employees who spend at least part of their time on green activities. Together, the two groups represent nearly half-a-million jobs in California with green activities across all industries. The survey revealed that 7.9 percent of employers have employees with some type of green activity, and that three quarters of current green workers were trained on the job.