A national wind-power lobby says a proposal by Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., and others requiring recipients of federal clean-energy grants to use “made-in-America” parts will slow project development and end up costing jobs in Montana.

“It shuts down the ability to raise money (for projects),” said Elizabeth Salerno, director of industry data and analysis for the American Wind Energy Association. “If you do that, no manufacturer is going to get an order. … If you’re not getting any orders, no one is getting any jobs.”

Yet Tester’s office said Monday he stands by the proposal, which says project developers qualifying for the grant must manufacture their project components in the United States.

“When you require wind-energy technology and equipment to be made here in America instead of China, you don’t lose American jobs, you multiply them,” said Tester’s spokesman, Aaron Murphy. “That’s just common sense.”

Tester and a handful of other Democratic senators called on the U.S. Treasury Department last month to halt the awarding of grants until the restrictions are put in place.

The beef is over a federal stimulus-funding program that so far has handed out $1.9 billion in “convertible tax credits,” or grants, to scores of companies that have brought wind, solar or other renewable-power projects on line after January 2009.

The Investigative Reporting Workshop at American University in Washington, D.C., reported in February that nearly 80 percent of the grants went to foreign companies.

The report concluded that a majority of those taxpayer funds financed the purchase of wind turbines and other parts manufactured overseas, thus using stimulus dollars to create jobs in foreign countries.

Salerno said the study was flawed, however, because it suggested all wind turbines manufactured by a foreign company are manufactured overseas.

While some turbines installed here are manufactured overseas, all foreign wind-power firms receiving the money either have or are planning manufacturing plants in America, she added.

“The name of the wind company has no bearing on where those jobs are,” Salerno said. “They have facilities here employing hundreds of people. … They are setting up shops here in the United States. It just takes time to make all of your components here.”

The stimulus grants are helping push renewable-power development during a time of tight credit, she said, and if Congress puts restrictions on the grants, development will be disrupted and discouraged.

AWEA estimated that 1,000 jobs could be lost in Montana, based on the number of power projects on tap in the state that could be halted. To qualify for the grants, projects must break ground by the end of this year and be operating by 2012.

Tester, however, doesn’t believe that insisting grant recipients use U.S.-made parts will disrupt the industry. Foreign companies can still qualify for the money, as long as the qualifying project uses material manufactured in the United States, he said.

Tester doesn’t want the United States to lose any production or commercialization of clean-energy technology, and believes manufacturing should be encouraged here, Murphy said.

Murphy also noted that Tester has been a strong supporter of wind-power development, including his sponsor of the bill that created a state law requiring utilities to buy a minimum amount of renewable power.

“Jon believes Montana can and will be a world leader in renewable-energy development, and he is working hard to ensure that any upcoming climate-change legislation taps into that potential,” Murphy said.