NDP Energy critic Peter Tabuns called Premier McGuinty’s ribbon-cutting today at a new wind plant near Chatham an attempt to paper over his government’s failure to support renewable energy and a slap in the face to Ontario’s manufacturing workers. “The government likes to say that it has doubled the amount of wind energy on line, but doubling close to nothing doesn’t cut it. Manipulating statistics and making noise about small one-off announcements can’t hide this government’s failure to adequately invest in proven renewable alternatives,” said Tabuns. “And to add insult to injury, these windmills were manufactured in Europe. At the same time that Ontario has lost more than 230,000 manufacturing jobs, the McGuinty government has done nothing to attract high-paying green-collar manufacturing jobs. There’s no reason why these windmills couldn’t have been manufactured right here in Ontario,” added Tabuns. Tabuns said the McGuinty government’s performance on solar energy is even worse, with the government committed to only increase solar energy by 200 megawatts by 2027 – far less that the 1000 megawatts installed in Germany in 2006 alone. Tabuns noted that while the costs of wind and solar energy continue to drop as production increases and technology improves, the cost of large-scale nuclear is increasing. “Ontario has built 20 nuclear reactors and not a single one has been on time or on budget. Ontarians are still paying debt charges each month from the building of past reactors and will do so until 2020. Recent experiences with reactors in France and Finland shows that new generation of nuclear technology is even more expensive and unreliable,” he said.