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Hey, did you know that the clean-energy economy employs more people than the fossil fuel industry and also offers higher wages to its less skilled workers? True, that’s only the case if you count as “clean” radioactive-waste-producing nuclear plants and waste management — but hey, it’s a start.

Thank the Brookings Institution for the new factoid, which came this week in a new report that attempts to define and count every U.S. clean economy job held between 2003 and 2010. And it does manage to provide a holistic picture of how and where so-called green jobs are being created in the U.S. It also makes a few discoveries that challenge common perceptions of the field. Here are a few items that stood out.

Solar and wind are not clean job leaders

When terms like clean energy and green-collar jobs get thrown around, many assume this means wind turbine workers and solar panel installers.  However, the Brookings study defines it more simply — and broadly — as the economic sector that produce goods and services with an environmental benefit.

That mean many more industries — some which weren’t consider clean energy jobs two decades ago — fall under Brookings’ green umbrella. That includes everything from retrofitting homes and public mass transit to battery technologies, geothermal energy and waste management.

A huge clean economy contributor is waste management and treatment jobs, which employ nearly 400,000 workers. The majority of them work at the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, followed by the city of Los Angeles and New York City.

Check out the study’s interactive map to dig into the numbers even further.

• Biofuels/biomass — 20,680 jobs
• Wind — 24,294 jobs
• Solar photovoltaic — 24,152 jobs
• Nuclear energy — 74,749 jobs
• Green consumer products — 77,264 jobs
• Energy-saving building materials — 161,896 jobs
• Waste management and treatment — 386,116 jobs

It’s manufacturing and export intensive

The report found 26 percent of all clean economy jobs are manufacturing-based, compared to just 9 percent within the broader economy. Electric vehicles, green chemical products and lighting were the biggest manufacturing contributors.

And on a per job basis, businesses in the clean economy export about twice the value of a typical U.S. job. The biofuels, green chemicals and EV industries are all highly export intensive, according to the study.

Pay is higher, and not just for engineers

In the clean economy, a low-and middle-skilled workers make more than the same level of employee nationally, the study says:

• Median wage  is nearly $44,000,  about 13 percent higher than median U.S. wage;
• More than two-thirds of all clean economy jobs fall within the middle-wage “green collar” category;
• Almost half of all jobs in the clean economy are held by workers with a high school diploma or less, compared to 37.2 percent of U.S. jobs.

Go South, young worker

The West has the largest share relative to its population. However, seven of the 21 states with at least 50,000 clean economy jobs are in the South. The Gulf coast states are often associated with the fishing and offshore oil and gas industries. Surprisingly, Texas, Florida and Georgia are also leaders in the clean energy sector.

For example, Georgia, which is ranked ninth in nation, had 83,707 clean energy jobs. Green building materials, conservation and waste management and treatment were clean energy segments that employed the most people in that state.