Source 29: Green jobs in Michigan

Green jobs:  United Solar Avonic featured on NBC Nightly News (Youtube.com, 2/9/09)

Summary:

This video news story gives an example of how a solar company is helping the economy by bringing new jobs to Michigan.

Topic:

Should the Obama administration allocate large amounts of money ($150 billion) in this time of economic crisis to alternative energy sources?

Category:

Journalistic- mainstream

What is it?

It is a video news story found on youtube.com of a report done for NBC Nightly News.

Author:

Anne Thompson

Accessed:

3/5/09

Support:

Mark Morelli, United Solar Ovonic CEO

Jennifer Granholm, Michigan governor

Anne Thompson, reporter

These sources represent the CEO of United Solar Ovonic who talks about what his company manufactures and what the benefits of their products are, the governor of Michigan who explains how bringing green businesses into Michigan is helping the state rebuild after the economic issues of the auto industry, and the reporter who brings the story together and gives it an angle.

Audience and Agenda:

NBC Nightly News is a nightly television news program.  It is the number one national nightly news program.  It averages around 9.5 million viewers per broadcast.  The NBC network is owned by NBC Universal which is a unit of General Electric.  GE is a publically traded company.  The station makes its money from television advertising and public investment.  NBC.com gets about 12.8 million hits per month.  It is a national news company so it caters to a broad audience from all walks of life.  This video has 547 hits on youtube.com.

Usefulness:

This video gives an example of how green jobs can be used to stimulate the economy.  While other companies are cutting back their workforce, the company in this story is expanding.  This shows that these companies can be an ecnomically viable option in the future.  This story tells how these workers are being trained and how working for this company benefits them.  It also speaks about how this company is keeping jobs in the US and manufacturing a product that is being exported to foreign markets.  80% of the products produced at the plant are exported.  The rest of the world’s demand for these products could give the US a product made domestically that has a huge margin for growth.  Investing in companies such as these could bring states like Michigan a much needed boost to their economic infrastructure.  However, this story does not say how many other companies there are like the one in this story.  This could be an unique case, but it does stand as an example of a company that could be a model for other green companies in the future.

About NBC:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBC

http://www.quantcast.com/nbc.com

About NBC Nightly News:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/18/nbc-nightly-news-with-bri_n_168000.html

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032619/

About United Solar Ovonic:

http://www.uni-solar.com/interior.asp?id=113