Two reports see jobs boon in spending on clean energy

Two reports released Thursday project that if $150 billion were spent annually on clean energy rather than fossil fuels, the United States would see a net gain of 1.7 million jobs each year.

A dollar-for-dollar transfer from fossil fuels to renewables is "not really going to happen," said Robert Pollin, professor of economics and co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts and co-author of both studies.

But the idea behind the research is to show how significant nationwide spending on clean energy would create jobs, Pollin said in an interview.

Arkansas stands to gain 18,000 jobs with annual spending of $1.3 billion and Little Rock 3,707 jobs each year by spending $332 million, according to the reports, "The Economic Benefits of Investing in Clean Energy" and "Green Prosperity," both conducted by the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

The projections were based on the assumption that $150 billion annually would be shifted from spending on fossil fuels and transferred to manufacturing jobs in the clean-energy sector.