Wichitopekington

Gov. Mark Parkinson said today that it will take “almost a Marshall Plan” to develop green energy in America.

Parkinson called for national standards to require renewable energy use and subsidies and regulatory changes favoring environmentally friendly energy sources, especially wind power.

He said in the last five years, Kansas has gone from essentially no wind power to the No. 7 producer in the country, with more than 1,000 megawatts of wind capacity now on line.

But taking wind power nationwide will require improvements to the transmission system and other actions by the federal government, he said.

Parkinson made his remarks to the annual meeting of The Energy Council, a group of elected officials and energy company executives from energy-producing states, Canada and Venezuela.

Some representatives from other states were cool to the idea of federal intervention.

Alaska state Rep. Craig Johnson, R-Anchorage, said the federal government can’t supply solutions that would help all states.

Alaska, for example, has its highest power demand during winter months when the nights are long and winds are generally calm, he said.

“A universal fix is not the answer,” he said. “It’s got to be a local fix.”

Saying more than 3,000 Kansans will exhaust their unemployment benefits in the next two months, state Labor Secretary James Garner called on Congress to extend benefits for displaced workers.

Garner joined nine other state labor chiefs at Niagara Falls, N.Y., to press the Senate to follow the House in passing a benefits extension bill.

The House version would allow unemployed workers who exhaust their benefits to get an additional 13 weeks of payments, if they live in a state with an unemployment rate of 8.5 percent or more.

Kansas unemployment is at 7.1 percent, not high enough for workers here to qualify under the House measure.

Garner called on the Senate to drop the benefit-limiting provision when it takes up its version of the bill.

“Action taken by the House this week is a step in the right direction, but I would urge the Senate to consider expanding benefits in states that have not yet reached the 8.5 percent unemployment threshold,” Garner said.