Flanked by stimulus program criticism and upcoming midterm elections, Vice President Joe Biden claimed four major energy innovation breakthroughs as a result of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act energy programs.
On Tuesday, Biden said the billions of stimulus money going to energy programs will keep American competitive in the future economy. The specific goals Biden said the U.S. is on-track to achieve are cutting the cost of solar power in half by 2015; cutting the cost of electric vehicle batteries by 70 percent by 2015; doubling U.S. renewable generation capacity and manufacturing by 2012; and cutting the cost of a personal human genome map to under $1,000 in five years.
Biden’s Tuesday declaration comes after mounting criticism of the Obama administration’s handling of the economy has led to speculation of a major Republican victory in the midterm elections in November.
Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Energy inspector general said the stimulus investments in energy programs had been slow to create jobs, which is ARRA’s stated goal. Inspector General Gregory Friedman was specifically talking in his audit of the stimulus investment in the Energy Efficiency & Conservation Block Grant Program, which found less than 9 percent of the $3.2 billion allocated for the program had been spent. The program is roughly halfway to its 2012 deadline.
While Friedman’s report was specific to the block grant program, its findings apply to issues that have other stimulus energy programs lagging behind: endless bureaucracy, too many rules, lack of preparedness, and the initiative to grow the energy industry to a cleaner, more renewable future.
