How stimulus saved renewable energy

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — On a mountain top 80 miles northeast of Bangor, Maine, in country where houses and gravel pits are mere pinpricks on a map green with forest, Paul Gaynor is making stimulus work.

Gaynor, chief executive of First Wind, is using $40 million in federal funds to help build a wind farm that will produce enough power for 13,000 homes and has created 200 construction jobs.

Without stimulus, First Wind’s project — and most renewable energy projects across the country — may not have happened.

“To us, it’s been essential to get through the nuclear winter of financing ability,” Gaynor said, referring to the dark days of early 2009 right after the financial collapse. “The recovery act was the bridge that got us from a broken market to one where projects actually get done.”

CNN