Renewable energy creates jobs. To see how many, just have a look at this slide from today's presentation from the German Environment Department.

The horizontal bars show the impressive level of investment in renewables in Germany (22.9 billion Euros) but its the vertical bars that show a spectacular story. There are now 382,000 people employed in renewables in this country.

Doing some rough maths and adjusting for population size, that's the equivalent of over 104,000 people in Australia. Or almost double the number of people we employ in coal mining, oil and gas combined.

With the right political will, we too could create our own green jobs machine.