Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
HILL AIR FORCE BASE — Standing next to an array of solar panels at Hill Air Force Base, President Barack Obama announced Friday the base will participate in a new program aimed at employing veterans in the solar energy industry.
The Solar Ready Vets is part of the administration's overall goal of employing 75,000 people around the country in the solar energy industry by 2020. HAFB will join four other military installations already participating in a pilot program.
Obama, whose first visit to Utah was set to end after the speech, traveled to the base from the Salt Lake Sheraton Hotel in a motorcade that attracted well-wishers along the way.
Spectators lined 600 South in Salt Lake City and found vantage points along the freeways to wave at the president and snap photos, including motorists along southbound I-15 between Centerville and Kaysville who stood on top of their cars.
Some waved homemade signs reading, "God Bless BO" and "Welcome to Utah President Obama" as the motorcade whizzed by on a freeway cleared of traffic.
Before his speech, the president participated in a roundtable discussion with Utah Republicans Sen. Orrin Hatch and Rep. Rob Bishop; Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker, a Democrat, and other Utahns, including a veteran.
The group, which also included officials from the Salt Lake Community College solar program, talked about their experience supporting renewable energy deployment as well as training workers to enter the solar industry.
"You guys are getting a lot of stuff done," Obama told the group. The president said "part of the goal is not just to talk about the work we've done on renewable energy but how we can train more and more folks to get involved."
The community college will help military personnel at Hill AFB transitioning into civilian life train to take positions in the solar energy industry. A pilot program is already underway on three military bases nationwide.
One roundtable participant, Judy Fisher, the solar program coordinator for SLCC's Green Academy/Energy Institute, told reporters earlier in a White House conference call it has been "very inspiring to me to meet the soldiers."
Air Force veteran Michelle Fisher, who was deployed four times in the Middle East, also joined the discussion. Fisher is currently attending the community college program to train as a solar panel installer.
The Solar Ready Vets pilot program is already at Camp Pendleton in California, Fort Carson in Colorado, and Naval Station Norfolk in Virginia, and will be expanded to 10 U.S. military installations nationwide.
Dan Utech, the president's deputy special assistant for energy and climate change, told reporters in the morning conference call the country is making "amazing progress in solar energy." 
