WALES is missing out on the economic potential of clean energy, the Wales Green Party leader said.

Pippa Bartolotti, from Malpas, said her party is clear that re-training and investment in new energy would bring a huge bonanza in jobs and industry, especially amongst our more impoverished communities still struggling to recover from the mine closures.

She said: “We should not just be harnessing the energy, but manufacturing the kit as well. Added to the tragedy of job losses, is the fact that overseas companies are setting up in the UK to make wind turbines. These should have been Welsh companies building wind mills for Welsh communities and providing good Welsh jobs.”

Siemens, the world's largest maker of offshore wind turbines, has won an order worth between £750 and £850 million from British utility Scottish Power, to build more than 100 turbines for the East Anglia One project, the first order for Siemens' new UK factory in Hull.

Pippa Bartolotti added: “We are talking about generations of missed opportunities. Unemployment and underemployment in Wales should never have happened. In Scotland, where the challenge of clean energy has long been met, they are producing almost 100 per cent of their electricity from renewables, unemployment is low and female employment is at its highest on record.”