"Shipping materials from China also "blows the whole point about zero carbon dioxide," he added. "You're on the wrong side of the energy curve."
State governments are also offering substantial incentives--free rent in industrial parks, tax holidays, loans, grants--to woo these companies. "States do not want to be left out of the next industrial revolution," Surace said.
Some of the most aggressive states include New York, California, and New Mexico.
The heartening part of all of this is that Surace isn't alone. Bruce Jamerson, CEO of Mascoma, which wants to make cellulosic ethanol, has said the same thing. Mascoma is building plants in Michigan, New York, and Tennessee because that's where the wood chips and vegetable matter are. Several analysts have said shipping is one of the big barriers for Chinese solar-panel makers.
Granted, it's not like these companies are staying in the States because the CEO woke up one day to a Bob Seger song playing on the radio and started getting misty-eyed over the disappearance of the industrial heartland. They are being encouraged to stay stateside in part because of subsidies.
But other factors--like shipping costs, the low prices of their products, and the proximity to local markets--could conspire to get the manufacturing arm of the country moving again."
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