Faculty Spotlight

Professor Peter Philips

In the summer of 2011, Professor Peter Philips released a preliminary report, “Should Green Jobs Be Outsourced?”, which analyzed a proposal by Sempra Energy to build a 1250MW electrical transmission line from Mexico to the Southern California electrical grid in order to import wind farm electricity from Mexico to the San Diego area. The alternative would be to build solar farms in Imperial Valley, the California county with the highest level of unemployment in the state. Philips concluded that the Sempra proposal would cost as much as 15,000 jobs in Imperial County and California plus surrounding states. This research received considerable public and political attention including resolutions in the California Senate and Assembly against the Sempra proposal. The final report was finished in August 2012, and in the Fall of 2012, the Department of Energy responding in part to the employment costs of the proposal, granted Sempra the right to build a scaled-back 400MW transmission line across the border.