{"id":4463,"date":"2013-07-02T09:48:44","date_gmt":"2013-07-02T13:48:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/?p=4463"},"modified":"2013-07-02T09:59:02","modified_gmt":"2013-07-02T13:59:02","slug":"clean-green-metro-florida-by-brookings-institution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2013\/07\/clean-green-metro-florida-by-brookings-institution.html","title":{"rendered":"Clean Green Metro Florida by Brookings Institution"},"content":{"rendered":"

\r\nAmy Liu spoke about globalization last week in Orlando,\r\n\r\n\"Leaders<\/a>\r\nabout clean industries leading economic growth.\r\nEven though she was talking linear growth,\r\nher Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings Institution\r\nhas some interesting points that mesh with the exponential growth like compound interest\r\n\r\nGeorgia can get on with in solar and wind power<\/a>.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nThe Florida Economic Development Council\r\n\r\n2013 FEDC Conference 26-28 June 2013<\/a>\r\nwas the venue for Amy Liu’s\r\n\r\nA Globally Competitive Florida: Regional Opportunities in the Next Economy<\/a>.\r\nTo summarize her slides (which are\r\n\r\nin a format not easily linkable<\/a>,\r\nshe bashes Congress to motivate cities leading.\r\nIn particular, Florida’s 20 metro ares have 61.75 of land area,\r\n94.1% of population, and 95.9% of output.\r\nNothing surprising there: cities are densely populated.\r\nTwo of the biggest in Florida are in our Floridan Aquifer:\r\nOrlando and Jacksonville.\r\n(She didn’t mention the aquifer; I did.)\r\n

\r\nThe national economic\r\nrecovery is slow, the middle class has been hard-hit,\r\nand Florida is recovering faster, except on unemployment.\r\nThe U.S. population is rapidly getting older and by 2050\r\n53.7% will be minorities, each of which have very different\r\neducational achievements, and much of this is happening\r\nin metro areas.\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nHer solution is global competition.\r\nShe notes none of top 20 global metros by “economic performance”\r\nare in the U.S. (except 1 in Puerto Rico, with 13 in China,\r\n2 Saudi Arabia,\r\n1 India,\r\n1 Australia, 1 Indonesia, 1 Macau, which is also China).\r\nTampa is #141, Orlando #171, Miami #227, Jacksonville #258.\r\nLooking over here at\r\n\r\nNews Release: GDP by Metropolitan Area, Advance 2011, and Revised 2001\u20132010<\/a>\r\nby U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Economic Analysis 22 February 2013,\r\nwe find that Valdosta MSA was still shrinking economically in 2011,\r\nat about the same rate as Orlando or Tallahassee,\r\nwhile Jacksonville was shrinking less.\r\n

\r\n\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nAmy Liu thinks the opportunity for prosperity is innovation,\r\nlow carbon, and exports.\r\nShe goes into that in some detail (employment in “advanced industries”,\r\nSTEM jobs, and patents).\r\nLeaders will seize the clean economy, “a Growing Global Market”, she says,\r\nbut I think her slide misses half the point.\r\nIt’s not straight line growth we’re seeing in clean jobs:\r\nit’s like compound interest,\r\n\r\naveraging 65% per year 2005-2010<\/a>.\r\n\r\nIt’s exponential growth like\r\n\r\ncomputers or smartphones<\/a>.\r\n

\r\nOn slide 42 she finally mentions a federal government role in all this:\r\n

\r\n“Open new markets through free trade agreements”\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\nShe doesn’t mention that that’s one of the big reasons for\r\nthe collapse of the U.S. middle class.\r\nRoss Perot was right:\r\nthat giant sucking sound you hear is NAFTA and other free trade\r\nagreements siphoning away U.S. jobs.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nCuriously, she never mentioned solar or wind power in her presentation.\r\nSolar power and wind power off the coast can produce more electricity\r\nthan Georgia needs, especially during the day, and can be exported\r\nthrough the grid to other states.\r\nThat is already creating clean jobs for Georgians.\r\nIf we get a move on and do this, the expertise acquired in\r\na smart grid (I’m looking at you, Southern Company, with your\r\nvaunted biggest private R&D operation in the country),\r\nin solar installation and distribution, and in wind technology,\r\ncan also all be exported.\r\nExported without substantial disadvantage to our own production,\r\nbecause we have more sun than more northerly states,\r\nand if we can make wind turbines work in hurricanes,\r\nwe can produce power when it’s cloudy inland.\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nPlus, much of this solar production can be both on rooftops\r\nin cities and towns and<\/em> on farm workshops and in\r\nsolar farms outside the cities.\r\nThat goes beyond Brookings’ city-driven approach.\r\n

\r\nShe also didn’t mention agriculture.\r\nLocal and organic agriculture can be combined with solar power\r\nfor a resilient local economy, which is in my mind more important\r\nthan further global interdependance.\r\nThere are some interesting statistics and ideas in Brooking’s\r\n\r\nMetropolitan Policy Program<\/a>, if you can view them\r\nwithout drinking the global free trade fizzy soft drink.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nMeanwhile,\r\n\r\nsolar and wind compound annual growth will beat everything else in about a decade<\/a>.\r\nIf Brookings wants to help metro (or rural) areas lead,\r\nit might want to mention the fastest growing industry in the world,\r\nsolar power, which will change the world faster than anything she did mention.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

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