This letter to the editor appeared in The Blade.

Responding to the editorial Renew the Renewables on Oct. 6, The Blade gets it wrong when it calls for taxpayer-funded subsidies to continue for one energy industry — renewables — while at the same time calling for an end to subsidies on another energy industry, in this case repealing the corrupt House Bill 6.

Subsidies, like the ill-advised nuclear bailout in HB 6, are taxes on electricity that increase its cost and do nothing to improve reliability for Ohio consumers. Advocates of taxpayer-funded subsidies for renewable-energy companies contend that the subsidies will create a cornucopia of new jobs, which was demonstrated to be false in the Buckeye Institute’s own research, which found that green-job growth does not make up for the job losses in other sectors.

The simple truth is renewable energy is growing in popularity and becoming increasingly cost competitive with other energy sources and does not need taxpayer-funded subsidies to survive or thrive.

And dispensing billions of dollars of taxpayer-funded subsidies — for nuclear, coal, natural gas, or renewables — can corrupt good government and corrode the public’s trust, as we saw with HB 6.

The best policy for Ohio is an end to all taxpayer-funded subsidies and corporate bailouts.

GREG LAWSON
Research Fellow at the Buckeye Institute
Columbus