Ohio Stays Grey

[irishbobcat]

While South Carolina Turns Greener, Ohio Stays Grey

April 10, 2008

The South Carolina legislature will be enacting bills offer more tax breaks for residents to save and produce alternative energy.

The bills offering bigger tax breaks for South Carolina residents to buy energy efficient homes and appliances are expected to come before lawmakers this week.

One bill eliminates sales taxes on a variety of home products that meet or exceed federal Energy Star rating requirements including refrigerators, water heaters, dishwashers, clothes washers, air conditioners, fluorescent light bulbs, programmable thermostats and doors and windows. But the items must be bought this October or April 2009 and the break is limited to $2,500 in merchandise.

A second bill would give a sales tax break to companies buying machinery, tools or parts to produce electricity from alternative sources, including solar, wind, tides and biomass.

Other bills being considered address existing incentives for people installing solar water heaters or panels to generate electricity.
The tax break makes the cost of putting in solar panels more reasonable while shortening the time it takes for the systems to pay for themselves with reduced energy bills. A solar hot water system that costs $6,000 comes with a $1,800 federal tax credit and $1,500 from the state. That means the system will be paying for itself in less than six years, Producing renewable energy could help the state's economy too. One recent report showed the state could expect to create more than 22,300 jobs in wind, solar, geothermal and biomass production.

Once again we see another state thinking with helping create tax savings for homeowners to turn to adding renewable energy sources to their homes as well as creating new jobs and economic growth for their state.

It's time we send a state representative like myself who will again work to see that Ohio foes not continue to lag behind other states in embracing renewable energy tax breaks for our citizens and creating new renewable energy manufacturing jobs for our poor, working, and middle class citizens of the Mahoning Valley.

Dennis Spisak-Independent Green Party Candidate for State Representative-60th district.

Campaign site: Http://votespisak.tripod.com  Please visit our link on health care and progressive job programs for our valley.