CITIZEN POWER ALLIANCE

Despite Pennsylvania's efforts to encourage alternative energy use, a state tax credit to encourage such systems has quietly been pulled back, a casualty of the 101-day budget standoff earlier this year.

Gov. Ed Rendell last July announced the Alternative Energy Production Tax Credits to cover 15 percent of the total cost of a project up to $1 million per taxpayer. But the money—about $50 million over eight years—was eliminated as the recession reduced revenues and a proposed tax on natural gas extraction was defeated.

"This is one of a number of good programs ... that were unfortunately reduced substantially or put on hiatus," Rendell spokesman Michael Smith said. "We're still making great headway in building a green economy here."

John Hanger, the state's secretary of environmental protection, acknowledged that elimination of the credit at least through June 2011 was "not a good thing." But he said that and other cuts were needed to ensure funding for public education, prison systems, and Medicaid for senior citizens living in nursing homes.

(Click to read the entire article)