Building green tech: fostering a strong investment climate will help Indiana.

• Author: Kharbanda, Jesse
• Position: VIEWPOINT

OVER THE LAST DECADE, Indiana has focused on promoting such sectors as life sciences and logistics. It has made steady progress in these sectors. But Indiana has yet to embrace the extraordinary potential of 'green tech'--zero-carbon technologies like renewable energy and energy efficiency--as a major sector of 21st century Indiana. While Indiana is attracting commercial-scale wind farm investments and even a gearbox factory for wind turbines, it lags behind much of the upper Midwest in terms of overall investment in renewable energy component manufacturing. Furthermore, Indiana unfortunately leads the region, per capita, in carbon dioxide emissions.

Indiana needs a fast-growing green technology sector to create new jobs, moderate our state's energy prices, and provide an attractive destination for entrepreneurs.

According to a 2008 manufacturing study, Indiana has more than 1,300 manufacturing businesses that could be re-tooled to produce renewable energy components, giving Indiana the second-highest potential in the country for such jobs.

Indiana's State Utility Forecasting Group predicts that our state's electricity rates may rise by 45 percent by 2025 as Indiana's carbon-intensive energy sector will be heavily impacted under future carbon regulations. Indiana can offset that increase by investing aggressively in energy efficient solutions.

Indiana has the lowest number of high-tech jobs per worker in the upper Midwest. That especially calls for Indiana to promote new sectors that will attract premier entrepreneurial and young professional talent to the state. "Green tech," which draws more venture capital than any other sector in the nation, has the potential to play this role.

Given the benefit of greater green investment, Indiana's entrepreneurs ought to...