This blog is written by Sandra Boone, Communications Associate for the BlueGreen Alliance.

I am often one of the first people at BlueGreen Alliance’s offices in Minnesota in the morning. See, as Communications Associate for the BlueGreen Alliance, one of my daily responsibilities is to compile all of the renewable energy, green jobs, workers rights and related media coverage for The Source, our daily compilation of the Blue-Green news stories from around the world (you can get this news compilation in your inbox every morning, by the way, by signing up here).

While it is always interesting to see some of the great gains being made, over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been disappointed to read more and more stories — like this one here — talking about how America is falling in the clean energy race, and the future could look even worse.

That is why I was excited to hear the BlueGreen Alliance Foundation had partnered with GLWN and WIRED-Net to host Making It Here: Manufacturing Our Energy Future in Cleveland, OH July 11-12. This two-day conference will bring renewable energy advocates and policy experts together with manufacturers, supply chain managers and Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM) representatives to discuss America’s clean energy future and the economic opportunities being created in the wind, solar, natural gas, energy efficiency and advanced transportation industries.

In addition to fifteen breakout sessions (seen here), conference attendees can look forward to:

• A keynote address by Louis Schorsch, Executive Vice President of Arcelor Mittal.
• A panel discussion of Smart Policies for a Manufacturing Revival with Chris Ayers, President of Global Primary Products at Alcoa; Arun Majumdar, former Director of the Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) program; Carl Pope, former Executive Director and Chairman of the Sierra Club; and others.
• Countless networking opportunities including an optional Dinner Cruise on Lake Erie.
• An exhibit floor featuring industry suppliers, vendors and consultants.
• A tour of Lincoln Electric.
• One-on-one meetings between supply chain representatives and OEM (interested companies should contact Ed Weston with GLWN at 216-980-1965 for more about setting these up).
• Post conference support for interested companies from GLWN and BGAF. 

This national conference is meant to help manufacturers understand the clean energy industry and how they can become part of it and its supply chain. There is no reason America’s clean energy technology should be made anywhere but here in the United States. Let’s go to Cleveland and work together to ensure these jobs, and dollars, stay here.

I look forward to reading about it in the headlines every morning when we succeed.

P.S. You can attend this two-day conference at the discounted price of $375 if you enter BGAF as a discount code while registering (this price does not include the optional $50 dinner cruise, which you can pay for separately).