The AWEA Blog: Into the Wind


Fact check: Kavulla off target on wind's cost

Posted: 12 Dec 2011 Tom Gray

In a lengthy Power Engineering magazine opinion article criticizing utility regulation, Travis Kavulla, chair of the Montana Public Service Commission, also discusses the cost of renewable energy. We'd like to set the record straight with a few facts not mentioned by Mr. Kavulla:

- Recently, Alabama Power Co. decided to purchase wind-generated electricity from Tradewind's Chisholm View wind farm in Oklahoma.  The Alabama Public Service Commission reviewed this purchase and commented, "Specifically, the delivered price of energy from the wind facility is expected to be lower than the cost the Company would incur to produce that energy from ...


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Fact check: Newman misleads on wind incentives and more

Posted: 07 Dec 2011 Tom Gray

Alex Newman has a column in New American magazine bashing wind power on a wide variety of grounds. Some facts he neglects to mention:

Older wind turbines are being replaced with new, more efficient models: While there are still a number of 1980s-vintage turbines in the three California passes--Altamont, Tehachapi, and San Gorgonio--where the first commercial wind farms were installed, many are scheduled for replacement with newer, more modern turbines (wind farm "repowering") during the next few years. For example, NextEra Energy will be repowering Altamont wind farms containing 4,000 turbines by 2016 and enXco, another owner of projects in the pass, has said it intends to follow suit.

Wind power needs a federal incentive to help it ...


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WindTV: Wind power generates good jobs for young people

Posted: 06 Dec 2011 Carl Levesque, AWEA Editor & Publications Manager

Recent Columbia Gorge Community College grad excited to embark on wind career

Timo Macke grew up watching wind farms sprout up around him. That must have planted a seed, because the 20-year-old just received his associate’s degree in renewable energy technology from Columbia Gorge Community College in Oregon.

Macke is featured on the latest segment of WindTV, which is the American Wind Energy Association’s (AWEA) recently launched vehicle to highlight how wind power works for America. Several years ago, Columbia Gorge Community College ...


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Schwarzenegger calls for level energy playing field

Posted: 06 Dec 2011 Tom Gray

The Washington Post recently featured a noteworthy opinion article from former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) concerning market distortions in government treatment of energy sources and calling for a level playing field. Highlights:

- While "support for energy innovation has always helped drive America’s growth ... [w]hen the oil, gas and nuclear industries were forming, federal support for those energies totaled as much as 1 percent of federal spending. Subsidies available to the renewables industry today are just one-tenth of 1 percent."

- "If our goal is to encourage competition in the energy marketplace, ...


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Don't hit wind with job-killing tax hike

Posted: 05 Dec 2011 Denise Bode, AWEA CEO

Cross-posted from National Journal's Energy & Environment Expert Blog.

Congress should extend the renewable energy production tax credit (PTC) before the end of this year. Here is why:

First, American manufacturing jobs are coming back, with tens of thousands of new jobs from wind power. But these jobs could vanish if Congress allows the credit to expire, in effect enacting a targeted tax increase, crippling an American manufacturing success story and sending our jobs to foreign countries. With a job-killing tax increase on the horizon and the PTC's future uncertain, businesses are hesitant to plan future US wind projects, American manufacturers have seen a ...


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Opinion: Dr. W. David Colby: Turbines and Health

Posted: 02 Dec 2011 Tom Gray

IPPSO FACTO (Magazine of the Association of Power Producers of Ontario)

November 2011, Volume 25, Number 5

 

When I became the acting medical officer of health for Chatham-Kent, little did I know that I would be swept headlong into controversy about harnessing the wind right here in our backyard. Three years ago, I was asked to help make sense of the conflicting information the local council was receiving about the effectsof wind turbines on human health.

 


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Fact check: Olson sells wind power short

Posted: 02 Dec 2011 Tom Gray

In an article on U.S. News & World Report's "Debate Club" blog, Jon Olson, an associate professor in the Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering Department at the University of Texas at Austin, compared wind unfavorably to natural gas. The following response was posted as a comment.

It's my hope that Dr. Olson sees that clean, homegrown American wind energy actually does work today!

First, please note that Dr. Olsen’s wind capacity numbers are actually low by 50%. The average capacity factor for wind in Texas is over 30%, which means the fleet of 10,000 MW produced over 3,000 MW on average, not the 2,000 he claims, and a 2-MW turbine produces .6 MW on average.


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Fact check: Pompeo and Labrador miss mark with subsidy bill

Posted: 01 Dec 2011 Tom Gray

The call for an end to all energy subsidies from Congressmen Mike Pompeo (R-Kans.) and Raul Labrador (R-Idaho) could be a laudable goal if it treated all energy resources fairly and treated energy fairly relative to other sectors.  Unfortunately, their proposed legislation doesn't work that way. It unfairly singles out wind power, the most promising source of new American manufacturing jobs, while protecting billions of dollars in incentives for other energy sources and all non-energy sectors. Honest reform of tax incentives must start with a level playing field.  The Pompeo-Ladrador proposal fails to do that.

Further, as the Idaho Stateman newspaper pointed out ...


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Fact check: Martikainen misguided on capabilities of renewable energy

Posted: 01 Dec 2011 Michael Goggin, AWEA Manager-Transmission Policy

Finnish physicist Jani-Petri Martikainen has authored an article on the blog Brave New Climate questioning the ability of renewable energy sources to provide 100 percent of global electricity generation. The following was posted as a comment.

Thank you for the post. While your method has some technical flaws (some have already been pointed out by others above, I’ll address some others at the end), the largest problem with this post and your previous post is more fundamental.

The fundamental problem appears to be a confusion between the concepts of energy and capacity. From the perspective of someone ...


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Tipping point? Investment in renewable energy tops fossil fuels for first time

Posted: 30 Nov 2011 Tom Gray

Global investment in power plants fueled by renewable energy sources topped investment in fossil fuels for the first time in 2010, according to a new report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF).

The report placed investment in renewables at $187 billion for the year, compared with $157 billion for power plants fueled by coal, natural gas, and oil.

An article from Bloomberg News quoted United Nations Environment Program Executive Secretary Achim Steiner as saying, “The progress of renewables has been nothing short of remarkable ... You have record investment in the midst of an economic and financial crisis.”


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