Obama touts green energy at Boulder City solar plant

Under a clear and sunny Boulder City sky, President Barack Obama marveled Wednesday at vast rows of nearly 1 million glittering solar panels arrayed in the desert and vowed to keep investing U.S. tax dollars in clean energy to power more U.S. homes.

"As long as I'm president, we will not walk away from the promise of clean energy," Obama said, comparing his Republican naysayers in Congress to disbelieving members of the Flat Earth Society of yore. "We're not going to walk away from places like Boulder City."

Obama's pledge came in the face of GOP criticism for rising gasoline prices nearing $4 a gallon and questions about whether his administration has wisely invested in renewable energy after the failure of Solyndra, a California solar panel maker. It got a $535 million Energy Department loan guarantee.

The president's midday visit to Sempra Energy's Copper Mountain Solar 1 plant outside Boulder City was his eighth trip to the battleground state of Nevada since he won the White House in 2008.

The three-hour stop in Southern Nevada was part of a two-day, four-state tour to promote Obama's "all-of-the-above" energy policy. It's an election-year push to develop both green energy such as solar, wind and geothermal as well as more oil and gas production in the United States. The president also stopped Wednesday in New Mexico and plans to hit Oklahoma and Ohio today.

Obama has been slammed by the GOP and the Republican presidential candidates for blocking the 1,700-mile Keystone pipeline project that would carry oil from western Canada to refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast. On Thursday, Obama plans to use a trip to Cushing, Okla., to fast-track construction of a portion of the Keystone pipeline from Oklahoma to Texas that doesn't require presidential approval.

"We are going to continue producing oil and gas at a record pace," Obama said, explaining he wants to use every tool to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil. "That's got to be part of what we do."

Republicans said Obama's energy efforts are "too little, too late."

Darren Littell, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, criticized Obama for visiting Nevada to talk about clean energy instead of the economy, jobs and home foreclosures.

"He is not focusing on the economy," said Littell, who traveled to Boulder City on the same day Obama stopped there. "He's focusing on his pet projects while people want to hear solutions about jobs and about gas prices. They don't want to hear more campaign rhetoric."

Nevada has the highest unemployment rate in the nation at 12.7 percent.

Obama was greeted at McCarran International Airport by Clark County Commission Chairwoman Susan Brager. She said she spoke to him about home foreclosures -- the highest in the nation in Nevada -- and about education funding in light of Southern Nevada schools' budget constraints.

"I was able to speak to him for a moment," said Brager, who has been a real estate agent for 23 years. "I hope we continue to work on education and continue to look at our housing market and the economy because it's very challenging."

In his 17-minute speech at the plant, Obama struck back at GOP critics and called on Congress to end $4 billion in U.S. subsidies to the oil industry, saying a century of government help is enough.

"That doesn't make any sense," Obama said. "I didn't think it was a wise use of your tax dollars."

He added, "It's time to end the taxpayer giveaways to an industry that's rarely been more profitable, and double down on investments in an energy industry that has never been more promising," Obama said.

The president noted that Copper Mountain Solar 1 can power 17,000 homes and that another Sempra plant under construction could power 45,000 homes. Under development is a third solar plant that could provide energy to another 66,000 homes, he said. The energy is being shipped to California customers.

Obama said some 5,600 solar companies nationwide are producing enough solar energy to power 730,000 U.S. homes. He said his administration has approved 16 additional solar projects that could one day boost power enough to supply up to 2 million homes.

Boulder City is the perfect site for solar projects, enjoying 320 days of sunshine a year, he said, and with access to power transmission lines. The city, about 20 miles outside of Las Vegas, also has plenty of flat land to build the solar panel arrays, which look like a glistening lake from afar.

"This is an extraordinary opportunity for the community," Obama said, noting several hundred construction workers got jobs. "This is not just happening here in Boulder City."

Obama criticized opponents who call renewable energy work "phony jobs" because they only last while the project is built with few workers needed to maintain clean energy plants.

"These politicians need to come to Boulder City and see what I'm seeing," he said. "They should talk to the people who are involved in this industry, who have benefited from the jobs, who benefit from ancillary businesses that are related to what's going on right here.

"Now, all of you know that when it comes to new technologies, the payoffs aren't always going to come right away," he added. "Sometimes, you need a jump start to make it happen."

The solar array at Copper Mountain is the largest photovoltaic facility in the nation. It also generates lease payments to Boulder City; about $233,000 is expected in 2013.

Sempra received $42 million in federal tax credits for the solar energy project and another $12 million from the state in sales and property tax abatements.

Boulder City Mayor Roger Tobler said he is proud of the green energy oasis in the desert. He also noted that the project has been in development for years before Obama took office.

"Finally we are starting to see some awareness and recognition of the fact that we're leading the way in solar energy," Tobler said. "This is something we've been working on for eight years."

Boulder City has long been associated with big U.S. government projects. It began in 1931 as a place for workers to live as they built the Hoover Dam, once the biggest dam in the nation.

The city's 15,000 residents displayed mixed feelings about Obama's stop there.

"It doesn't impress me one bit," resident Carri Stevens said of Obama's visit. "He's going to take credit for a solar plant that was started 10 years ago, and he's trying to make up for Solyndra's mess."

Longtime resident Laura Godbey Smith welcomed Obama's tour of the solar plant.

"The president realizes the vital importance of the development of green power in Nevada and the Southwestern United States," Godbey said. "It is a future we are building for our children, their children and future generations."

A Nevada conservative think tank criticized spending tax dollars on the Copper Mountain project.

The Nevada Policy Research Institute said the plant got $10.8 million in tax dollar subsidies per permanent employee with five working at the facility Obama toured.

"President Obama's visit to the Solar 1 facility in Boulder City is the perfect illustration of why the president's economic policies are such a failure," said Andy Matthews, president of NPRI. "The government has spent over $50 million to 'create' five permanent jobs and build a plant producing a product -- expensive solar energy -- that no one would purchase without a government mandate. That's not a path to a vibrant economy; it's the road to serfdom."

The president and many Nevada leaders, however, see the state's vast potential for solar, wind and geothermal energy as a way to diversify the tourism- and gaming-dependent economy. Proponents of government tax subsidies, loans and other such public help argue the investment today in the private industry will lead to more jobs and revenue for Nevada and the nation in the future.

"We've got to develop new energy technologies, new energy sources," Obama argued. "It's the only way forward. And here in Boulder City, you know that better than anybody."

Boulder City Review reporters Rose Ann Miele and Arnold M. Knightly and Review-Journal reporter Kristi Jourdan contributed to this report. Contact reporter Laura Myers at lmyers@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2919. Follow her on Twitter @lmyerslvrj.