Methodology
The intent of Jobs and Economic Development Impact (JEDI) is to construct a reasonable profile of investments (e.g., solar plant construction and operating costs) to demonstrate the employment and economic impacts that will likely result during the construction and operating periods. Given fluctuations in power plant costs and changes in industry and personal consumption patterns, the analysis does not to provide a precise forecast, but rather an estimate of overall economic impacts from specific scenarios.
Each JEDI model uses the same basic input-output methodology. That is, dollars spent on a power generation project in a state, county or region are analyzed to determine their employment and economic impact within the local area. Local spending results from using:
- local labor (e.g., concrete pouring jobs),
- services (e.g., engineering, design, legal),
- materials (e.g., wind turbine blades),
- or other components (e.g., nuts and bolts).
The portion of project spending that is purchased locally can be adjusted by the user (to reflect project-specific details) under the "local share" category.
JEDI models utilize economic data (multipliers and consumption patterns) derived from the Minnesota IMPLAN Group (MIG) to estimate the local economic activity and the resulting impact from new energy generation plants. MIG compiles and aggregates national and regional economic and demographic data to calculate inter-industry linkages and the relationships between changes in demand for goods and services, and the associated economic activity at the local, state and regional levels. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory performed extensive interviews with power generation project developers, state tax representatives, and others in the electric power industry to determine appropriate default values contained within the models. However, actual project spending on goods and services can vary significantly by project and location. Similar to local shares, these values are easily adjusted by the user to account for variability among projects.
Comparing Results from JEDI Model Runs
When comparing results from JEDI models for different technologies, it is best to compare between facilities with equivalent energy production rather than comparing facilities with a similar nameplate capacity (e.g., compare jobs to kilowatt-hours, not jobs to kilowatts installed). In either case, capacity factor and energy production should be considered when comparing the economic development benefits from different power generation technologies.
