It’s that time of the year - time for resolutions and action! We’ll help you with both by running down the latest news in the green economy:

• Gamesa Ships 1000th Nacelle from its Pennsylvania Plant: Gamesa Technology Corp. a global leader in the design, manufacture, installation and maintenance of wind turbine generators and the development and sale of wind farms, has announced the completion and shipment of its 1,000th nacelle manufactured at its Fairless Hills plant in southeastern Pennsylvania.Gamesa was the first overseas wind manufacturer to set up full production facilities in the United States, officially selecting Pennsylvania in September 2004 as the site for its U.S. headquarters, East Coast development office and two North American manufacturing facilities.
• Oil refiner chips in for wood-to-biofuel plant: After years of delays, biotech company Mascoma appears to have the funding to build a wood chip-to-ethanol plant. The company today said that fuel refiner and investor Valero Energy will create a joint venture to build a $232 million plant in Kinross, Mich. The plant will convert lumber used for paper into ethanol using Mascoma’s streamlined production process The companies said that the plant will be able to produce 20 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol a year, which can be expanded to double that. Construction is expected to start in the next six months and be completed by the end of 2013.
• Cleantech Innovation Shines In Green Incubator: After an intense twelve weeks, featuring 200 hours of coaching, countless hours of brainstorming and product testing, and a helpful dose of financial support, the moment of truth arrived for the companies of Greenstart. In the San Francisco incubator’s first Investor Day each of the four companies got to pitch their ideas to more than 100 angel and venture capital investors in hopes of securing support before being flung from the nest.
• Solar Project Helps Veterans Gain Green Job Skills: Three Bay Area veterans committed to building sustainable communities and helping other vets make the transition to civilian jobs raised more than $7,000 to help sponsor a two-day, hands-on training for local veterans to install a solar electric system on the home of a low-income family in San Francisco’s Bayview district.
• Sustainability Program Gives Job Hunters Edge:Individuals looking for an edge securing jobs in the green industry are apparently finding it through the University of Colorado Boulder. The university offers a Sustainable Practices Program that provides individual courses and a professional certificate focused on issues often encountered in green jobs. Since the program’s start in 2007, more than 290 people have enrolled. Classes through the program are not for university credit, are open to the public and can be taken individually or as part of the professional certificate. The professional certificate requires 100 credit hours including three core classes: “Organizational Change for Sustainability,” “Communication Strategies for Sustainability” and “Tools and Techniques for Sustainability.”

Here’s the latest roundup of news from the green economy and work world:

• AM General to Build Hybrid Truck Platform for Bright Automotive: Bright Automotive has entered into an agreement for AM General to be Bright’s exclusive North American assembler for the Bright IDEA vehicle platform. The Bright IDEA is an all-new, plug-in hybrid electric work-truck which uses innovative technologies to provide businesses with a powerful new economic solution focused on the lowest total cost of ownership.
• GE to Supply 350 Wind Turbines to BP Wind Energy for Upcoming US Projects:  Houston-based BP Wind Energy is purchasing 350 GE 1.6-megawatt (MW) wind turbines for U.S. wind farm projects being developed in 2011 and 2012. Total value of the equipment orders and a five-year services agreement is approximately $750 million. GE’s wind turbines will generate more than 560 megawatts of electrical power for the project.
• Suzlon Opens State-of-the-Art Training Center for Wind Technicians:  Suzlon’s eco-friendly training facility will feature a 4,000-square-foot lab, an 8,000-square-foot wind-turbine training center and North America’s only fully operational wind turbine dedicated exclusively for training purposes. The training center is a new addition to Suzlon’s 64,000-square-foot central distribution center in Elgin, Illinois, which opened in October 2010.
• While Washington bickers, green tech goes local: GE plans to invest $600 million to build thin-film solar factory in Colorado solar panel factory in Aurora, Colo., based on thin-film technology originally developed at nearby National Renewable Energy Laboratories. The move comes amid ongoing political fighting in Washington, D.C., over the failure of bankrupt solar company Solyndra, which had received a $535 million federal loan guarantee to build a factory. What’s driving much of the green tech business activity now are state and regional policies, both in creating clusters of new companies and deploying wind and solar. But the effect is not widespread: a few states, including California, Oregon, and Massachusetts, are advancing clean-energy technologies while other regions idle.
• 5 Readily Available Green Jobs Training Programs: Here are some of the best training programs to land a green job: Renewable Energy Training; LEED Certification; Ecotourism; Wind Programs; Energy Auditors. Click here for more details.

As the immediate effects of the BP oil spill begin to fade, the long term effects are still be determined. The cleanup will continue to generate new jobs in the Gulf Region for months (if not years) to come. However, the oil spill wasn’t the only news in the green economy - read on:

• New efforts on a renewable electricity standard: Some clean energy and climate advocates have shifted their sights to a scaled-back but still ambitious goal: passage of a national renewable electricity standard. Such a law would require utility companies to produce a set amount of electricity from renewable sources by a certain date, spurring the development of clean sources like wind and solar and probably lowering overall emissions nationally. Such a standard would drive additional employment in the wind and solar sectors.
• Wind farm ‘mega-project’ underway in Mojave Desert: the project is officially breaking ground in the Tehachapi Pass, a burgeoning hot spot for wind energy about 75 miles north of Los Angeles. When completed, Alta could produce three times as much energy as the country’s largest existing wind farm, analysts said. It’s slated to be done in the next decade and will create hundreds of construction and maintenance jobs.
• New Stirling engine solar heating and power system in Colorado: Cool Energy, of Boulder, Colorado, a developer of clean energy heat and power generating systems, today announced that Xcel Energy will be providing research and analytical support for the first planned pilot field installation of the SolarFlowÆ System in a commercial building located in Boulder, Colorado.
• Xtreme Power raises cash for renewable-energy storage: Xtreme Power, an Austin, Texas company which is commercializing battery technology originally developed for electric vehicles, is expected to announce on Tuesday that it has raised nearly $30 million to expand into utility energy storage.

According to a recent report from the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), the solar industry could be responsible for 880,000 new jobs in the United States by the end of the decade. The association says the solar energy industry is capable of growing to the point of producing 15 percent of U.S. energy by 2020.But the SEIA says this depends on whether the federal government equals out the amount of subsidies given to conventional- (coal, oil) and solar-energy industries €” either by decreasing the amount of subsidies given to conventional energy or by increasing the amount given to solar energy.

The Environmental Law Institute reports that between 2002 and 2008, the federal government gave fossil-fuel industries $72 billion in subsidies. Over that same time period, renewable-energy industries received $29 billion, about half of which went toward the production of ethanol. More balanced federal subsidies would allow the solar-energy industry to offer more competitive energy prices.

If the solar-energy industry is able to increase its share of the energy market to the predicted 15 percent, the SEIA says it would cut U.S. energy-related emissions by 10 percent.

(By Sean Rosner)