“Forgotten by many proponents is the justification for the PTC in the first place: to reduce CO₂ emissions…. [Yet] … many utilities with large amounts of wind generation steadfastly refuse to release operating data for analysis. I suspect to do so would mean the release of empirical data to build the opposition’s case for insignificant CO₂ reduction and poor operating economics. I was unable to find one study of existing wind energy installations that found the CO₂ reductions predicted by AWEA.”

Robert Peltier, editor-in-chief of POWER magazine, is an honest broker. He understands the technical side of electrical generation as a professional engineer. He knows power generation in practice from his years of industry experience on the regulated and the nonregulated sides. He has taught the subject as a tenured professor.…

Since 2009, the State of New Hampshire has reviewed three large-scale wind energy facilities, totaling 177 megawatts. In each case, the project proponents engaged University of New Hampshire Professor and economist Ross Gittell and his research assistant, Matt Magnusson, to conduct economic impact studies to show the long-term (20-year) benefits the projects would deliver to the local area.

Figure 1 summarizes the findings of each report (please click for better resolution).

The UNH researchers relied on NREL’s Jobs and Economic Development Impacts (JEDI) or similar linear spreadsheet models to assess job creation and economic impacts for the three projects: Granite Reliable Wind Park, Groton Wind and Antrim Wind. The methodologies and assumptions for the three studies appear nearly identical.

In all cases, their reports showed minor direct job opportunities (15 full-time equivalent positions for operations at the three sites) but substantially inflated indirect and induced job benefits relative to the local area.…

While Invenergy waits for the federal Production Tax Credit (PTC) to be extended by this ‘Lame Duck’ Congress, as expressed in the 12/4/12 Batavia Daily News article: “Orangeville windfarm waits on the tax credit,” there are thousands of local tax- and rate-paying citizens who are eagerly awaiting the expiration, permanent expiration, of this $0.022/kWh subsidy. The PTC is nothing more than a tax-shelter-generator for wealthy, multinational, rent-seeking corporations like Invenergy.

How does a business plan dependent on massive taxpayer-funded handouts for profitability make it past the drawing board in the first place?!? Any of us would have filed such a plan to its rightful place—in the garbage can.

The American Wind Energy Association (AWEA)– with the help of political cronies in high places–have attempted, and failed to push the PTC through various bills, not once, not twice, but FIVE (5) times in a little over a year.…

“In its heyday the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation was a bastion of objectivity. However this show revealed nothing but wind apologetics. The absurdities were thick and one-sided without a single thread of verity.”

Recently the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) pretended to take on the endless debate around the topic most people know little about – the health problems created by industrial wind turbines. The results were quite disappointing.

The Sunday, October 21st program (two segments) skated around the issues like Barbara Ann Scott.

The first segment was a cut and paste “documentary” by a novice reporter from Kincardine, Ontario about people in her “home town.” Frustratingly, and sadly, this entire set up piece merely touched at the edges of the actual concerns many of which have been reported on CBC by actual CBC reporters.…