WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Friday, January 14th, U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm traveled to Albany, New York to amplify how the historic climate investments of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and President Biden’s Build Back Better Agenda will help lower energy costs, generate good-paying, union jobs and secure a safer and more reliable energy grid for New Yorkers and Americans across the country.

Secretary Granholm was accompanied by New York Governor Kathy Hochul, U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, U.S. Representative Paul Tonko (NY-20), Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan, and other local leaders to tour and deliver remarks at the Port of Albany, the future site of the first offshore wind manufacturing hub in North America. The group also visited New York Independent System Operator (NYISO), met with workers and students at Hudson Valley Community College, and toured the facilities of GE Global Research.

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The new manufacturing hub at the Port of Albany will create 5,200 jobs. State and federal leaders said it will create jobs in every spectrum, from engineering and planning, design to maintenance to construction. These are also union jobs.

Granholm said red states, like Texas, have invested in clean energy. 

"The "Build Back Better" agenda invests, incentivizes clean energy build back. There's a lot of pockets of the country that are conservative that have actually really embraced the wind and solar … who sees this clean energy future as growing the pot, who don't see it as they're fighting against fossil fuels, but they see it as an opportunity to create jobs." 

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For New York, the new projects bring the state closer to its goal of achieving 9,000 megawatts of offshore wind energy by 2035, and a zero-emission electricity sector by 2040. For the Capital Region, it means jobs.

“This big facility that will be built [will] require construction workers and tradespeople. You can see the towers that will be built, which will require specialized manufacturing workers. You can see the longshoremen who will position and put them on the barges," Granholm explains."Here we go, over a thousand jobs that will be here.”  

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New York has picked the state’s second offshore wind project in the same week that federal regulators announced plans to auction more waters off the south shore of Long Island. 

"Hats off to Governor Hochul for taking a huge step towards lowering energy bills for New York households, creating thousands of good-paying jobs and advancing President Biden's goal of a robust offshore wind industry in America,” U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said in a statement Friday. “We can and will overcome the challenge of climate change, and we'll do it one clean energy worker at a time.”  

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“Everybody feels a sense of urgency about getting these incentives going. In one way or another we are determined … ” said U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm. 

Tonko and Granholm, a former Michigan governor, were among officials at the Port of Albany to celebrate the finalization of several large contracts to build and operate a series of massive wind turbines off the coast of Long Island. They were joined by Gov. Kathy Hochul and executives of state agencies as well as several wind turbine and energy companies, including Equinor Wind, BP and Marmen Welcon. 

The towers and platforms will be moved to Long Island on barges, which Granholm noted is another source of employment. “The barges have to be built somewhere. Those are more jobs,” she said.