Liberal Massachusetts democrats oppose clean, renewable wind power.

townhall.com ^ | May 20, 2002 | John McCaslin

[Robert357]

Last time I looked the production tax credit was subject to escallation and at its escalated value higher than 1.7 cents per kwh, exclusive of state or local tax credits.

Most new combined cycle combustion turbines will produce power (at current nat gas prices) for about 3 to 3.5 cents per kwh. Wholesale new power power costs are in the range about 2.8 to 4 cents per kwh depending on a lot of things. Retail, is on the order of the amounts you indicate but toward the high end of your range. Retail power and wholesale power are two different animals and have all kinds of different services bundled with them. Your windmill costs need to include transmission, transmission ancillary services, and a whole bunch of distribution costs if you want to compare them to retail rates.

The 25 MW project I was looking at, used the now bankrupt Advanced Wind Turbine (AWT-26/WC 86) on 140 foot towers. FloWind (the old verticle eggbeater mfg) acquired the design from AWT and then went bankrupt, which ended my project. The AWT design seemed to have incorporated a lot of the lessons learned from the problems in California. Yes, technology has marched on since the mid-90's, so I would expect some improvements, but from what I have heard in talking to vendors, I see attempts to increase size to capture economies of scale (which is also creating more visual concerns and more concerns for more appeles in fewer baskets, i.e. if more capital is tied up in a maintenance failue, it better be quick to fix).

Again, I think wind is a good resource in the right place, but in some sectors it is over-hypted, it is not a perfect technological "silver bullet." As a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers Solar Energy Division, who has attended Wind Energy Committee meetings in the past, I do try to generally follow what is happening.

[chs68]

That's Ed, Fatso The Lush, Kennedy

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