Bree Halverson: Minnesota’s clean economy should power good-paying, safe jobs

March 1, 2023 by

Gov. Walz signed the 2040 clean energy standard into law during a ceremony at the St. Paul Labor Center in February 2023. (Minneapolis Labor Review photo)

Minnesota has a new law that puts us on a path to 100% clean energy by 2040. That’s indisputably good for the environment. Thanks to the strong labor standards and equity provisions in the bill, it will also be great for all workers in our state, specifically union workers.

Our nation has been struggling with economic inequality for decades, and it has only worsened over the years. The U.S. Census Bureau reported that income inequality in 2018 – the gap between the wealthiest Americans and the average worker – had reached the highest level recorded since the bureau started tracking the gap. According to the Economic Policy Institute, CEOs in 2020 were paid over 350 times more than the typical worker.

This is also a problem facing Minnesotans. The income gap here is significant, particularly for people of color, who are 300% more likely to be in poverty than white people. Unionization is a key pathway to fixing this growing problem facing our state.

There is a major reason why the 100% clean energy bill had such strong support from unions and why it was signed by Gov. Tim Walz at the St. Paul Labor Center. The measure rightfully tied specific labor and equity standards to the implementation of the bill.

For example, there is an emphasis on creating local, high-quality jobs in Minnesota. The bill encourages new energy generating facilities to be sited in communities where fossil-fuel generating plants have been retired or are scheduled for retirement. It also says that emissions reductions that clean up our air should also make the air cleaner for communities that are facing environmental injustice, and that all workers and communities should see the benefits of this law.

Perhaps the most important provision is a requirement to recognize the rights of workers to organize.

Kevin Pranis of LIUNA Minnesota spoke during the bill signing ceremony.

Unions matter. There is a direct correlation between the increase in income inequality and the decrease of worker power, as the share of workers in a union has fallen from 24% in 1979 to under 11% now. Unions also make job sites safer. Unionized workers are better trained and better protected to blow the whistle if they see something dangerous going on, without fear for retribution from management because the union has their back. Finally, unions can help overcome long-standing inequities for people of color in our state.

Clean energy has been great for our economy. Workers around the state are making buildings more energy efficient, constructing wind turbines and more. There are an estimated 57,000 jobs in clean energy, energy efficiency, advanced transportation and other clean sectors in our state. Now, as we grow those jobs, more and more of them will be good-paying, safe, union jobs.

Our environment also matters. Climate change is already here and impacting us all. The action we take now will determine the future of our state. We should be fixing what was broken and leaving future generations a cleaner environment than the one we inherited from previous generations. This bill will reduce the emissions driving climate change. That’s a good thing for everyone.

The future is bright for workers and our climate. The federal investments in the Inflation Reduction Act and the bipartisan infrastructure law, coupled with Minnesota’s own investments and policies like 100% Clean Energy, will ensure we are installing utility-scale solar with well-trained, local labor. We will expand the number of local wind jobs, keep workers safe on the job and build the technology of the future – like geothermal – here in Minnesota with union labor.

Thank you to the House and Senate DFL majorities and Gov. Walz for delivering this victory for workers and the environment.

– Bree Halverson is the Midwest States Director for the BlueGreen Alliance, a national partnership of labor unions and environmental organizations.

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Bree Halverson: Buying clean and fair for workers and the environment

April 18, 2022 by

Bree Halverson is Midwest states director for the BlueGreen Alliance.

Infrastructure is at the forefront of the minds of policymakers in our state. Minnesota will see an influx of funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, passed by Congress and signed by President Biden last year. The Minnesota Legislature is focusing on the state’s significant budget surplus, and the prospect of a bonding bill this year could mean long-awaited improvements to our water and transit systems, roads and bridges, and more. These investments will put Minnesotans to work.

Our state desperately needs this investment. Our overall infrastructure was given only a “C” grade by the American Society of Civil Engineers in their 2018 report card. In particular, our drinking water infrastructure is in dire need of repair. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates Minnesota will need over $7.5 billion in investment in our water infrastructure over the next 20 years. Doing that work will make our drinking water safer and create good-paying jobs for workers around the state.

It only makes sense that as the state makes these investments, we use materials and products for these projects that are made in places like Minnesota – and the rest of the country – with high environmental standards. That’s the basic concept of a policy called “Buy Clean.” It is a policy to promote spending taxpayer dollars on materials that are manufactured in a cleaner, more efficient, environmentally friendly manner. This reduces industrial pollution and health impacts, while supporting family-sustaining jobs and building globally competitive domestic manufacturing.

Buy Clean is something the BlueGreen Alliance and our partners have advocated for in other states. And we’ve achieved victories. Since its passage in California in 2017, states like Colorado, Washington and, most recently, Oregon have all adopted Buy Clean for materials used in infrastructure projects.

In Minnesota, a study of Buy Clean and Buy Fair policies was passed by the Legislature in 2021, with the leadership of Reps. David Lislegard (D-6B), Jamie Long (D-61B), Frank Hornstein (D-61A) and Zach Stevenson (D-36A), and was signed into law by Gov. Tim Walz. Buy Fair is a related policy which takes into account how companies treat workers, in the same way that Buy Clean weighs the emissions from making the products and materials.

The study called for in the 2021 bill was conducted by the University of Minnesota and presented to the Minnesota Legislature. Using the study as a guide, Minnesota House Climate and Energy Committee Chair Long and Rep. Lislegard are working to craft a Buy Clean and Buy Fair policy to be introduced this session that will help the state choose construction materials with the lowest amount of carbon, and that have been produced by companies that treat their workers right. They are working with unions, industry groups and government departments to make sure the policy will support the unique resources we have here in Minnesota.

The bottom line is that we make steel, concrete and other materials in America, and we do it better and cleaner. When it comes to the materials we use to rebuild and modernize Minnesota’s infrastructure, our state should reward workers and companies doing things the right way to reduce the emissions driving climate change by buying clean and buying fair. We should pass Buy Clean and Buy Fair this session.

– Bree Halverson is the Midwest states director for the BlueGreen Alliance, a national partnership of unions and environmental organizations headquartered in Minnesota.

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Cutting-edge geothermal system keeps Local 455 training center cool

April 4, 2022 by

Tony Poole, St. Paul Steamfitters and Pipefitters Local 455’s business manager, explains how a geothermal system cools the union’s Apprenticeship Training Center in St. Paul.

At its Apprenticeship Training Center in St. Paul, Steamfitters and Pipefitters Local 455 prepares the next generation of union members to work in a changing energy landscape. But the union’s training center itself stands as a testament to the potential for emerging energy technologies to create jobs in the pipe trades for generations to come.

Last summer, Local 455 used a newly installed, cutting-edge geothermal system to cool the facility, located off L’Orient Street and Maryland Avenue. Despite running on a limited capacity while ironing out some mechanical issues, the new system cut the union’s cooling costs by 85%, according to an analysis facilitated by Xcel Energy.

“We think it’s probably going to be the future of cooling,” Local 455 Business Manager Tony Poole said. “It virtually provides our building with free air conditioning. The only costs that we pay are for the electricity to run the pumps that cycle water through the building.”

Poole projected the union will recover the costs of installing the geothermal system within seven years of bringing it online.

“We were looking to promote clean-energy projects that pipefitters and steamfitters work on, so we decided to put a geothermal energy system into our training center and showcase it,” Poole said. “It’s good for reducing greenhouse gases and emissions, but it’s also good to promote the work we do in the clean-energy field.”

Initially, Local 455 considered a traditional geothermal system that would have required digging some 70 wells on the property – at the temporary expense of parking space.

Instead, the union connected with a Minnesota-based company that has pioneered a new kind of geothermal technology, one that embeds a heat exchanger into the aquifer. The pump cycles 52-degree water into a hydraulic cooling system throughout building.

Water enters the training center’s cooling system at 52 degrees and typically exits a degree or two warmer.

Just four wells are enough to cool the 100,000-square-foot facility.

“We’re not taking any water out of the aquifer,” Poole explained. “We’re just using the temperature of the water in the aquifer to cool the water coming in the building.”

The technology is so new that Local 455 needed a variance from Minnesota’s Department of Health before installing it. The union hopes that data collected from the site will help determine whether the geothermal system becomes part of the state’s regular permitting process.

“This is the first building of its kind to use this technology in the world that we’re aware of,” Poole said. “We wanted to be on the forefront of this, and we are.”

The local union isn’t being shy about showing off its new system, either. Local 455 welcomes local and state officials and politicians to tour the facility and learn more about the hydraulic cooling system – in the hopes that the pipe-heavy geothermal approach gets more attention as lawmakers look to invest in and encourage green energy solutions.

“Everybody talks about wind, everybody talks about solar because those are things people can see and understand,” Poole said. “People need to be talking about geothermal, and things like carbon capture and clean hydrogen. Our members want to hear elected officials talking about those technologies.

“All the piping throughout this building is what we work with every day as pipefitters.”

The geothermal cooling system may be just the start of a clean-energy makeover at Local 455’s training hall. Poole said the union has already removed 26 natural-gas-powered rooftop cooling units, installed when the building opened in 2015. That frees up space for a new kind of heating system.

“We’re actually working on quotes with a contractor right now to get thermal solar panels for our roof,” Poole said. “The technology puts a coil inside the thermal panel, which heats the water, and it could supplement the heat from our boilers.”

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Building a clean economy ‘on the high road’

March 5, 2020 by

When the U.S. House of Representatives passed the PRO Act last month, the labor movement celebrated – and for good reason. The measure would give working people a fairer shot at organizing unions, bargaining better wages and fighting back against rising income inequality.

But the PRO Act would be a win for the planet, too. That’s according to the BlueGreen Alliance (BGA), which lobbied for the PRO Act on behalf of 13 labor and environmental organizations.

Why? To address the climate crisis, the U.S. and other countries will need to replace fossil fuels with clean energy, and they will need to do it quickly. Mustering public support for that kind of massive political effort won’t happen, BGA Executive Director Jason Walsh said, unless there’s something in it for working people.

“We have to rebuild our infrastructure, we have to retool our manufacturing and we have to repower our grid with clean sources,” Walsh said in an interview for the March 2020 issue of the The Union Advocate. “That’s daunting, but it’s also an opportunity. And if we do it right, if we build this clean-energy economy on the high road, we have the ability to make this a more just and equal country and economy.”

Jason Walsh is executive director of the BlueGreen Alliance.

UA: The BGA works to advance policies that protect workers and the environment. That seems like divisive terrain right now. Where do you see potential to cut through the tension?

JW: Environmentalists and labor activists agree on much more than we disagree on. There have certainly been fights and disagreements. I’m not ignoring that. Those are hard, and they’re hard right now in places like Minnesota. But fundamentally, our labor partners and our environmental partners understand the interconnectedness of the fight for workers’ rights and environmental protection.

The PRO Act is an example of that. It’s obvious why our labor partners would support the PRO Act. Our environmental partners understand workers who are organized and empowered fight not only for their wages and benefits and job security, they also fight for things like making sure their plants don’t blow up, making sure that industries are not egregious polluters. Unions like the Steelworkers were some of the most important supporters of our bedrock environmental laws, like the Clean Air Act, because their members lived it and worked it.

UA: What does the clean-energy economy look like, and how do those jobs need to change?

JW: Not enough of the jobs created or promised are family-sustaining jobs. In 2019 only 4% of workers in solar electric power generation were union members, and only 5% of workers in wind power generation were union members. Obviously, the clean economy is much bigger than that, but those are the two fastest-growing sectors within it.

Companies within the clean-energy economy have just flat-out violated their employees’ rights to unionize. There’s Tesla, of course. There was also a solar company, Bright Power, in New York City, where workers were trying to join IBEW and were fired. And last year we saw at a company called Gestamp Wind in Texas, the company unlawfully firing and suspending employees, making threats, engaging in surveillance… It was so egregious that the National Labor Relations Board under the Trump administration ordered them to bargain with (Plumbers and Pipefitters) Local 404.

Why do those companies do that? They do it because they can, because our existing labor laws are completely toothless. That is why the PRO Act is so important as we make this monumental shift to a clean-energy economy.

UA: What’s the scope of this change our economy will need to go through?

JW: We’ve barely scratched the surface. We’ve seen a shift in the last 10 years within the power sector to renewable sources, but zero-emission power is still below 20% of the total. We have a transportation sector that is now the biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the country. And we’ve got an industrial sector that is the fastest-growing source of emissions.

We’re going to have to shift all of them to zero-emissions sources by 2050, and we’ve never done anything at that scale before in this country.

UA: What potential is there for working people?

JW: To give a taste, just take the offshore wind industry, which is potentially enormous. There is, at this point, one offshore wind facility in this country, off of Block Island, Rhode Island, and it was built with union labor. This was just five turbines, but it created 300 jobs – electricians, welders, ironworkers, pile drivers, backhoe operators. That wind farm is now producing enough clean, local electricity to power 17,000 homes. We’ve got to do that by orders of magnitude more across the country.

There is a ton of work here, but we’re at this inflection point as to whether we’re going to continue what we’ve seen – mostly low-road, often low-quality jobs, almost exclusively nonunion – or build this economy along the high road.

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