SOLAR TODAY - May 2012

| bill ritter innovators

bill ritter

There was pushback. “There’s this story that
you can’t have clean energy and job growth,”
Ritter said. “Colorado proved that wrong. It’s
important to understand that it’s a political
world. You need to get in there and fight. When
you poll people in Wyoming and Montana about
their choices for electricity generation, the sun is
number one. Coal is last. We need to make that
connection back to elected officials and make
it have political consequences. Clean energy
means business. A lot of businesses are dedi-
cated to retrofits and insulation, smart meters
and transmission. In Ohio, it was the business
community that tamed [Gov. John] Kasich,
when he tried to roll back the renewable energy
incentives. We have wonderful environmental
organizations but they have less clout than the
business community.”