Gaston Cantens Pushes for Green Collar Jobs and Renewable Energy in Florida
Gaston Cantens, who serves as Vice President of Corporate Relations for Florida Crystals Corporation, says his company produces enough renewable energy in its South Florida biomass power plant to power is sugar factories and tens of thousands of homes. But, he claims the company could make even more clean energy than it currently does through its New Hope Power Company.
Why doesn’t Florida Crystals produce more renewable energy? Gaston Cantens, a former majority leader in the Florida House of Representatives, recently told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel newspaper that Florida Crystals does not run its biomass power plant at full capacity because the company is only being paid between 4.5 cents to 5 cents per kilowatt hour for the renewable electricity it generates and sends to the Florida electrical grid. Because of the regulatory system in Florida, the company cannot sell directly to consumers and they are at the mercy of what the large utilities will pay them. In order to make a profit, Florida Crystals would like to sell its renewable electricity for 10 cents to 13 cents per kilowatt hour. Cantens asserts that price is less than what most utilities charge their consumers for it.
Along with the greater amount of clean electricity that would be produced, Gaston Cantens says the advantage of his company’s brand of power is that biomass power also produces more jobs than other types of power generation. According to Cantens, electricity generated by biomass power produces ten times more economic activity than electricity produced using fossil fuels. He contends that figure equates to more jobs in Florida at a time when the state’s leaders are trying to find ways to boost the economy. Those jobs, Cantens says, are permanent and sustainable, and not just short-term jobs like in the construction of new power plants.
Author :
Gaston Cantens is a Vice President of Florida Crystals Corporation, a vertically integrated sugar company with headquarters in Palm Beach County, Florida, where his responsibilities include corporate relations and government affairs.
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