Free Republic

CHEYENNE — A Wyoming legislative committee on Wednesday voted against sponsoring two bills to tax wind energy development. Industry representatives and lobbyists warned members of the Joint Revenue Committee at a meeting at the state Capitol that the proposals to tax wind power would increase costs for Wyoming households and hurt the state’s fledgling wind industry. “You need to not cobble together all these tax notions into one bill,” said Larry Wolfe, a lawyer representing Duke Energy, a major wind power developer.

Leadership: As Palin jousts with Biden on energy independence, the government reports that we lead the world in energy reserves. From oil to gas to coal, we are sitting on prosperity. So why are we importing anything? One of the interesting sidelights of the NY-23 race was an exchange on energy independence between Vice President Joe Biden and the former governor of energy-rich Alaska, Sarah Palin. Biden, who came in to campaign for Democrat Bill Owens, was reminded of the issue of energy. "The fact of the matter is that Sarah Palin thinks the answer to energy was 'Drill, baby,...

Innovation: A New Rooftop Wind TurbineThe WindTronics turbine can generate energy at low speeds. By Nicole Marie Richardson Oct 1, 2009 The answer is blowing in the (very gentle) wind Generally, rooftop turbines can't produce electricity unless the wind is blowing six or eight miles per hour. This turbine is different. Developed by WindTronics, based in Muskegon, Michigan, it's only 6 feet in diameter and can generate energy at wind speeds of just two miles per hour. WindTronics moved the power-generating parts to the outside of the wheel, where the blades turn faster. Reducing the bulk in the center also...

Last year, Roger Jette turned down an eye-popping offer to relocate his Bay Shore factory to the state of Georgia. They would have given him land, architects to design his building, tax breaks, and $5,000 for every Georgian he hired. Instead, he found a way to stay here and still trim expenses, by tapping into a little-used but plentiful Long Island resource: wind. With the exception of the occasional tower on the East End, wind turbines are a rare sight on Long Island. But prompted by a Long Island Power Authority rebate and federal tax credits and deductions, they're sprouting...

Rights to build wind farms off the coast of Britain up to 50 times the size of the biggest present plants are expected to be handed to consortiums of major utilities, with the prize Norfolk field likely to go to Scottish Power and Vattenfall. The 5,000 megawatt the biggest in Europe when the first of its 341 turbines start working in 2012. Another utility consortium called Forewind, including RWEnpower Renewables, Scottish & Southern Energy, Statkraft and StatoilHydro, is believed to be the frontrunner for the even bigger 10,000 megawatt Dogger Bank plot in the North Sea. The awards are due...

Clean tech has seen a boost as the U.S. pours government funding into renewable energy, and China looks set to reap much of the benefits. Latest example: a Chinese wind-turbine company has just become the exclusive supplier for one of the largest wind-farm developments in the U.S. The Shenyang Power Group has signed on to supply 240 of its massive 2.5-megawatt wind turbines to a 36,000-acre development in West Texas. The Wall Street Journal reports that the wind farm is also slated to receive $1.5 billion in financing from the Export-Import Bank of China.

Austin-based Cielo Wind Power said Thursday that it will partner with Chinese and American companies to build one of the biggest wind farms in the United States. The project will cost $1.5 billion, cover 36,000 acres in West Texas and generate 600 megawatts of electricity — enough to power 180,000 homes. The agreement signals one of the largest undertakings of its kind, proponents said.

Has Affordable, Efficient Rooftop Wind Power Arrived? Of the 10,500 small wind turbines installed last year, 99 percent were attached to giant constructed towers in rural areas. Rooftop wind turbines—constituting 1 percent of the market—have a huge potential in urban and suburban areas. But the products, which are heavy, noisy and require permanently attaching wind-catching blades to homes, have not yet caught on. One inventor thinks his unique turbine is just what the market is looking for. Are rooftop turbines set to take off?

"The power to tax is the power to destroy." - Chief Justice John Marshall The US tax code is a marvelous and impressive intellectual structure. As an engineer I took a business class in taxation for corporations while getting my MBA. Engineering is the art of extracting utility from first principles of science and combining it with hard-won practical experience. I found, to my frustration, that taxation is not like that. Taxes are whatever Congress and the IRS say they are, logic or principle be damned. Tax codes are often written to support national goals, above and beyond mere revenue...

Climate: As alternate-energy champ Spain's green economy slides into recession, a German professor says if American "climate illiterates" don't follow, the Copenhagen climate conference will fail. And the bad news is? King Canute, the Viking king of England, Norway and Denmark, was the legendary king whose sycophantic followers praised his power and wisdom. As the story goes, he once stood on the shore and commanded the waves to halt. Rather than exercising his ego, he in fact was giving his followers a lesson in reality — the power of man over nature is finite and inconsequential. In December, the world's...

Oakland's BrightSource Energy Inc. said this week that it has scrapped a controversial plan to build a major solar thermal power plant in eastern Mojave Desert wilderness that Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein wants to transform into a national monument. The announcement ended a long-running dispute between backers of renewable energy and environmentalists strongly opposed to the idea of creating an industrial zone within 600,000 acres of former railroad lands that had been donated to the Department of Interior for conservation. The acrimony even triggered a nasty public squabble between Robert Kennedy Jr., a senior adviser at VantagePoint Venture Partners, which...

A weird and irrational cult has us in its grip. If the Mormons or the Moonies started taking over the BBC and the Government, which then harangued and persecuted us into wearing funny underwear or getting married in mass ceremonies, we would – I hope – rise in revolt. But the ‘Man-made Climate Change’ fanatics are applauded and praised, even as they force us to abandon perfectly sensible electric lights, and instead subject ourselves to strange, flickering substitutes, simultaneously worse and more costly than the ones they replace. There is worse to come. The same people wish to compel us...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) - The state Supreme Court has declined to hear an appeal of a Public Service Commission decision approving construction of a 124-turbine wind farm in southeastern West Virginia. The court unanimously rejected appeals filed by opponents of Beech Ridge Energy LLC's $300 million project after a hearing Sept. 2. A group called Mountain Communities for Responsible Energy and a Greenbrier County couple contended the PSC was wrong when it approved the start of construction in February. In giving its OK, the PSC said Beech Ridge had met all pre-construction conditions spelled out in an August 2006 PSC...

The U.S. Energy and Treasury Departments on Tuesday announced $503 million in government cash grants to companies developing renewable energy projects. The funding will help meet the Obama administration's goal of doubling U.S. renewable energy production over the next three years, creating jobs and providing financing on easier terms than many companies can obtain in the private sector. This the first round of some $3 billion in direct payments to companies in lieu of tax credits to eventually support an estimated 5,000 biomass, solar, wind and other renewable energy production facilities. "These grants will help America's businesses launch clean energy...

Initial Round of Cash Assistance for Wind, Solar Projects in Eight States Will Create Jobs, Increase DevelopmentWASHINGTON– Marking a major milestone in the effort to spur private sector investments in clean energy and create new jobs for America's workers, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Energy Secretary Steven Chu today announced $502 million in the first round of awards from an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (Recovery Act) program that provides cash assistance to energy production companies in place of earned tax credits. The new funding creates additional upfront capital, enabling companies to create jobs and begin construction that may have...

After nearly a six-month lull, Wall Street is getting back into the business of financing new wind farms. Morgan Stanley and Citigroup Inc. have invested $100 million each to finance separate wind farms this month, taking advantage of a brand-new federal program that is paying substantial cash grants to help cover the cost of renewable energy investments. Bankers say this is the beginning of an active pipeline of new wind-farm financing, as well as investment in large solar installations and geothermal facilities. Project developers and Wall Street appear to be viewing the federal cash grant program as such a good...

Energy Policy: Obama announces his energy team without mentioning a green source of renewable energy that could create jobs, reduce carbon emissions and reinvigorate a vital manufacturing sector — nuclear power.The domestic auto industry isn't the only uncompetitive industry that seems to require life-sustaining transfusions of government cash to stay in business. Alternative energy sources have relied on such subsidies, called "investments," for years. Yet in President-elect Obama's announcement of his energy team, we were told "the foundations of our energy independence" lie in "the power of wind and solar." Except that for these alternative sources there's been a severe...

Energy: While members of Congress take vacations their constituents can no longer afford, a country prepares to end its dependence on foreign oil by extracting supplies from shale rock. It's not the U.S. It's in the Middle East.Jordan imports 95% of its oil. Unlike the U.S., the desert kingdom plans on doing something about it. It does not, however, plan to cover its flat open spaces with solar panels or wind farms. It's going to do something the Democratic Congress has refused to do — get oil from its abundant shale rock. On Sunday, Maher Hjazin, head of the Jordanian...

Utility wonks have been quipping for years that the future of energy in the Northwest is windy and gassy. When it comes to wind power, the future has already arrived, a reality that has come rushing home in the past two years and created major friction among the Bonneville Power Administration, wind power producers and the agency's utility customers. The BPA, which markets the energy produced at 31 hydroelectric dams and a nuclear plant in the Columbia River Basin, has seen the amount of wind power flowing onto its grid nearly double in each of the past four years. That...

Teen blown out of pickup dies Tuesday, July 21, 2009 2:20 PM By Holly Zachariah THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH Funeral services are scheduled Thursday for a Marion teen who died in what authorities are calling a freak incident. Shawn Fowler, 16, was riding on top of a mattress to keep it secure in the bed of a Ford F-150 pickup truck Friday night. The truck was traveling about 25 mph westbound on Fairground Road just outside of Marion when a sudden storm blew through about 8:15 p.m., said Sgt. Michael Kasler of the Marion Post of the State Highway Patrol. The...

For 30 years, government has helped fuel wind-power research, development and deployment. The industry would not exist today without the continued generous support from (coerced) taxpayers and ratepayers because 30 years out, wind technology still isn't close to overcoming its main obstacles: it's intermittent and therefore unreliable; it's economically uncompetitive even with the largess; no sensible person wants it in his backyard. A year ago, with oil supposedly headed beyond $200 a barrel, it appeared wind power's time was at hand. And everywhere, oilman and former free-marketer T. Boone Pickens was promising energy independence through spinning turbine blades under the...

To meet ambitious renewable energy goals, city must find a way to pay for them. Austin's electric utility could soon reverse a long-standing practice of selling wind, solar and other renewable energy only to customers who choose to buy it, four Austin City Council members and a mayoral aide said this week.

Palin Vs. Kerry (And MoveOn.org) By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Wednesday, July 15, 2009 4:20 PM The political death of Sarah Palin has been greatly exaggerated. In a devastating op-ed in the Washington Post, Alaska's governor exposes the cap-and-tax fraud that has nothing to do with earth's temperature and everything to do with government control of the economy. She also exposes the stealth socialism ambitions of the Democratic left and once again points out the availability of abundant "shovel-ready" resources under America's soil, off America's shores and even in America's rocks. Judging from the reaction from Sen. Kerry and...

Politics: John Kerry, replying to an op-ed Sarah Palin wrote on cap-and-trade, suggests the Alaska governor "check the view from her front porch." What she sees from there, senator, is energy wealth going to waste.The political death of Sarah Palin has been greatly exaggerated. In a devastating op-ed in the Washington Post, Alaska's governor exposes the cap-and-tax fraud that has nothing to do with earth's temperature and everything to do with government control of the economy. She also exposes the stealth socialism ambitions of the Democratic left and once again points out the availability of abundant "shovel-ready" resources under America's...

Thirty years after Jimmy Carter's malaise speech, we return to the days of rising joblessness, an unresponsive economy, deference to dictators, gutting the military and an energy policy tilting at windmills... As history repeats itself on the anniversary of the speech MSNBC's Chris Matthews wrote, we wonder if the "Hardball" host, who has worked for four Democratic politicians, is still getting tingles up his legs. The Democratic Party apparently has learned nothing in the past three decades. Will we see a return of the misery index? The only thing that's different is the sweater.

If, somehow, we could instantly and magically replace every existing power plant in America with wind and solar power, there wouldn't be a single drop of crude oil that was truly saved by that action.

The push for conversion to plug-in electric cars will do nothing to stop carbon emissions, a report by the GAO warns, throwing cold water on a push by Democrats to get more plug-ins on the road. In fact, the problem could be made worse as demand goes up at coal-fired electrical plants. Plus, the need for batteries may just have the US changing the dictators to which we’re chained, as IBD reports...

Alternative Energy: A government report says reliance on electric cars will do little to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and may merely shift our dependence on foreign sources from one set of dictators to another..."If you are using coal-fired power plants, and half the country's electricity comes from coal-powered plants, are you just trading one greenhouse gas emitter for another?" asks Mark Gaffigan, co-author of the GAO report. The report itself notes: "Reductions in CO2 emissions depend on generating electricity used to charge the vehicles from lower-emission sources of energy."

The man backing part of the Global Climate scare can't even calculate how to place his windmills correctly, never mind his hot air about the much more complex subject, the climate. Plans for the world's largest wind farm in the Texas Panhandle have been scrapped, Pickens said today. He's now looking for a home for 687 giant wind turbines that he has already ordered. The windmills stand 400 feet tall—taller than most 30-story buildings. "When I start receiving those turbines, I've got to ... like I said, my garage won't hold them," the oligarch said. "They've got to go someplace."...

What's the single BEST way to achieve energy independence? A Weekly Poll.

The idea of wind generated electric energy is being sold by environmentalists as an overlooked opportunity to reduce greenhouse gasses. Global warming advocates claim that this discounted treasure could be a major part of an effort to reduce the burning of fossil fuels and eliminate the need for some of our nuclear power plants. Is it true that we are passing up on a gold mine of renewable energy in favor of unnecessary and harmful fossil and nuclear fuels? Let's start by looking at what we use to generate the power we use today. Renewables, such as wind, solar, biomass,...

KENYON -- Russ Foss has lived on his 500 acre farm, southeast of Kenyon, for more than 42 years. A dairy farmer, Foss has kept busy serving time on the local co-op board and growing crops in his field. But Foss is clear to say that his 500 acres will never be home to what some are calling a "second crop," -- wind energy. "When they (the turbines) came out, I myself thought it was a good idea," he said. "Wind sounds like a good idea, until you really look into it. Then there are just so many holes in...

There's coming a wind of balance ~ ~ ~ , Prominent change is about to enter your life , Life changing events calendared in my loving kindness for those in my will , I shall use you as a Horn of Cornucopia to pour out the fragrance and fruit of my very womb upon the multitudes , For you are my wellsprings of life in my name , Salvation ! Fire ! Hunger and thirst after righteousness ! The Blossom of Unity carrying the peddles of my love ! , Breath in ~ ~ (o: my fragrant words , Devour...

There's coming a wind of balance ~ ~ ~ , Prominent change is about to enter your life , Life changing events calendared in my loving kindness for those in my will , I shall use you as a Horn of Cornucopia to pour out the fragrance and fruit of my very womb upon the multitudes , For you are my wellsprings of life in my name , Salvation ! Fire ! Hunger and thirst after righteousness ! The Blossom of Unity carrying the peddles of my love ! , Breath in ~ ~ (o: my fragrant words , Devour...

Repeating past mistakes has long been a part of Washington's energy policy, but Congress used to wait a while before making the same blunder again. Not anymore. New legislation requiring wind energy closely resembles the ethanol mandate that sparked a backlash just last year. For many years, wind has benefited from generous tax credits and subsidies, but it still provides less than 2 percent of the nation's electricity. By comparison, coal supplies around 50 percent (and with considerably fewer federal incentives). Natural gas and nuclear, meanwhile, account for about 20 percent each. No wonder wind supporters want a federal mandate...

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Lost financing, low prices for natural gas and political uncertainty have stymied a potential boom in the U.S. wind power industry this year. [snip] Financial institutions no longer provide credit to wind farms based on the tax incentives and projected electricity revenues, and natural gas prices have tumbled from $12 per million BTU to under $4. [snip] The industry is now counting on a government bailout of a different sort -- legislation that would mandate that 25 percent of the country's electricity be generated from renewable sources by 2025, up from around 7 percent now, with wind...

Anti-Mafia magistrates in Sicily have opened a sweeping investigation into the wind power sector where local officials, entrepreneurs and crime gangs are suspected of collusion in the construction of lucrative wind farms before their eventual sale to multinational companies. Italian and EU subsidies for the building of wind farms and the world’s highest guaranteed rates, €180 ($240, £160) per kwh, for the electricity they produce have turned southern Italy into a highly attractive market exploited by organised crime. An earlier investigation into a case near Trapani in western Sicily resulted in eight arrests in February, leading to accusations of a...

Chihuahua blown away Report: Six-pound puppy found a mile away from where gust sent her flying

Why are we ignoring things we know? We know that the sun doesn't always shine and that the wind doesn't always blow. That means that solar cells and wind energy systems don't always provide electric power. Nevertheless, solar and wind energy seem to have captured the public's support as potentially being the primary or total answer to our electric power needs. Solar cells and wind turbines are appealing because they are "renewables" with promising implications and because they emit no carbon dioxide during operation, which is certainly a plus. But because both are intermittent electric power generators, they cannot produce...

Speaking in Iowa on “Earth Day” this afternoon, Pres. Obama lamented that only 3% of America’s electricity comes from renewable sources such as wind and solar. He held Denmark out as a model, mentioning that the Scandinavian country produces almost 20% of its electricity via wind. He also bragged about the new jobs being created in Iowa and elsewhere in the wind power industry. Does PBO think we don’t read? Does he really expect to pull the windy wool over our eyes? Can he really expect the facts about the failure of the Danish wind power experiment not to be...

Only a few years ago radical environmentalists would have been more circumspect in their energy pronouncements than members of the Obama Administration, many of whom seem to want to govern by slogan and sound bite rather than reality. Things have been happening in rapid fire and it seems now abundantly clear that the recession, economic crisis and economic stimulus will be used as a cover to usher measures with agendas that, if enacted and stay, would have a major negative impact on our lifestyles and our economy for decades to come. On April 17 the EPA declared finally what many...

The SunZia transmission line that would link sun and wind power from central New Mexico with cities in Arizona is just the sort of energy project an environmentalist could love -- or hate. And it is just the sort of line the Interior Department has been tasked with promoting -- or guarding against. If built, the 460-mile line would carry about 3,000 megawatts of power, enough to avoid the need for a handful of coal-fired plants and to help utilities meet mandated targets for use of renewable fuel. "We have to connect the sun of the deserts and the winds...

Weaning the U.S. off imported oil by drilling for known reserves off our coasts and under federal lands is a no-cost economic stimulus that would create 160,000 high-paying jobs and generate $1.7 trillion in new tax revenue and royalties. Tapping this resource would stop the flow of U.S. dollars to Middle Eastern sheikdoms, Hugo Chavez’s Venezuelan madhouse and other OPEC outposts of petroleum-fueled global lunacy. But even though a large majority of Americans favor expanding domestic oil and gas production, the Obama administration is literally tilting at windmills instead. The Minerals Management Service estimates that there are 115 billion barrels...

There is no evidence that industrial wind power is likely to have a significant impact on carbon emissions. The European experience is instructive. Denmark, the world's most wind-intensive nation, with more than 6,000 turbines generating 19% of its electricity, has yet to close a single fossil-fuel plant. It requires 50% more coal-generated electricity to cover wind power's unpredictability, and pollution and carbon dioxide emissions have risen (by 36% in 2006 alone). Flemming Nissen, the head of development at West Danish generating company ELSAM (one of Denmark's largest energy utilities) tells us that "wind turbines do not reduce carbon dioxide emissions."...

The British Wind Energy Association has called for more government action to help wind farm development, in a submission made to the UK Treasury department ahead of the April 22 Budget. The association warned Wednesday that a number of key projects now seeking finance face potential delays, threatening the UK's ability to meet its 2010 and 2020 renewable energy targets. "Independent onshore developers in particular are struggling to find finance, with projects being delayed and the rate of new applications falling," the association said. "Offshore, the timescales for Round 2 projects are being stretched to avoid deteriorating finances. There are...

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – Windmills off the East Coast could generate enough electricity to replace most, if not all, the coal-fired power plants in the United States, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said Monday. (snip) Salazar could not estimate how many windmills might be needed to generate 1 million megawatts of power, saying it would depend on their size and how far from the coast they were located. (snip)

Reporting from Arlington, Va. -- Wind turbines off U.S. coastlines could potentially supply more than enough electricity to meet the nation's current demand, the Interior Department reported Thursday. Simply harnessing the wind in relatively shallow waters -- the most accessible and technically feasible sites for offshore turbines -- could produce at least 20% of the power demand for most coastal states, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said, unveiling a report by the Minerals Management Service that details the potential for oil, gas and renewable development on the outer continental shelf.

Apparently Spain began subsidizing "green" jobs (in the wind and solar industries, sound familiar?) in 2000, and almost 10 years later they have experienced for every 1 "green" job created, 2 jobs are lost from the market. With nationwide unemployment over 8 percent right now, can we really afford to subsidize "green-collar" jobs in the U.S.?

A British engineer from Hampshire has broken the world land speed record for a wind-powered vehicle. Richard Jenkins reached 126.1mph (202.9km/h) in his Greenbird car on the dry plains of Ivanpah Lake in Nevada.

Optiwind, a Massachusetts company, wants to build an experimental windmill in lightly populated Goshen, with just 3,000 souls scattered across 45 hilly, wooded square miles. The windmill would be built near the town's sewage- treatment plant, which would benefit from the new source of power. The U.S. Department of Energy's goal is to have one-fifth of the nation's electricity come from wind in the next 25 years. A great many windmills will need to be built, but there are a great many places where they can't or won't be built: midtown Manhattan, for example; Civil War battlefields and other hallowed...