This is a very strange time in the wind turbine business/wind power industry. Technologically, great strides have recently been made in tapping the polar opposites of the wind energy spectrum - offshore wind (uses FAST winds to overcome the high installation cost). Meanwhile, the sales of Low Wind Speed Turbines (LWST) in the US as well as the use of taller wind turbine towers (100 meters, for example) are on a roll. For example, Vestas recently announced another project using 33 of their V100 x 1.8 MW units in Michigan (http://www.vestas.com/en/media/news/news-display.aspx?action=3&NewsID=2892) ,while RE Power announced the sale of turbines in SW Pennsylvania using "medium" speed turbines but using 100 meter towers (http://www.repower.de/en/presse/press-releases/detail-press/?tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=3558&cHash=f1811f56217a469104fc35ba401242a7). These are both ways to produce more electricity from a given site which happens to be reasonably close to large load centers (Detroit and Pittsburgh, respectively). GE now has over $500 million in confirmed sales of their LWST, the GE 1.6 MW x 100 meter rotor, and only a few of them have been installed to date. Vestas also announced 1000 MW of their V112 - a 112 rotor diameter x 3 MW rating - (now closer to 1.5 GW), worth about $4.5 billion in new sales, just for the turbines.
In the U.S., almost all of the wind turbines that are likely to be installed for the next several years have now been ordered, and construction is underway so that they can qualify for the Section 1603 grants (where 30% of the cost of the project is paid to the owner instead of them using the Production Tax Credit (PTC)). Perhaps 10 GW or more worth of turbines will get installed next year, and it looks like close to 8 GW could get installed this year. Unfortunately, on December 31, 2012, all of the incentives (mostly tax avoidance schemes available to only ultra wealthy people and corporations) will disappear, as so far the new crop of Republicans in Congress show no willingness to extend them. This will not mean that coal or gas fired units will replace them - and no new nukes are on the Horizon except for the twins in SE Georgia (Vogtle). It's just that without the net 3 to 5 c/kw-hr subsidies, new projects (which make electricity for between 8 to 13 c/kw-hr on a completely unsubsidized basis) cannot compete with electricity from old coal plants selling for 4 c/kw-hr or less. Instead, old coal plants will continue to be used. So, the wind turbine industry, and with it about 80,000 jobs, goes into hibernation until the equivalent of a Feed-In Law, mandated Power Purchase Agreements or new subsidies gets authorized.
One nifty example of the recent dash for installations might be near Sacremento, where the Sacremento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) is adding 128 MW of new wind capacity - 24 x 3 V90 MW units (fast winds) and 31 x 1.8 MW V100 units (slow winds). SMUD is a governmental utility (get the hint, Jamestown, NY?), and this will double their capacity to produce electricity from wind (http://www.vestas.com/en/media/news/news-display.aspx?action=3&NewsID=2418). Well, good for them, and phooey on Jamestown, NY, who are still lusting for a 50 MW coal burner to supply an average of about 5 MW of their electricity not supplied by NYPA. SMUD will take advantage of the REPI incentive, worth about $9 million per year for the next 10 years...
Meanwhile, one of North America's largest proposed offshore wind projects - the NaiKun project in British Columbia - still keeps on going. The market for this electricity - from the extremely windy Hecate Strait (about halfway between the Washington-BC border and the Alaska-BC border) in British Columbia - would probably be California. See this for details (warning, a 60 page report): http://www.haidanation.ca/Pages/Splash/Documents/Independent%20Evaluation_Tom%20Gunton_August172011.pdf. And there is this wind map of the region: http://www.offshorewind.biz/2011/11/23/naikun-updates-information-on-wind-project-relocates-office-canada/. Average winds look to be around 9.25 m/s at hub heights or more.... and will have twice the energy of the winds in the Cleveland, Ohio offshore project (about 7.5 m/s for this 20 MW pilot project). Of course, there are actually nearby customers for the Lake Erie project, while the NaiKun project might need at least 500 miles of new transmission lines...
Worldwide, the European banking system looks like it is headed for collapse, and mostly because of Germany's outrageous success, no less. Germany has become a major exporter, and especially with renewable energy systems, despite or because of the high wages workers get paid. It keeps racking up balance of payments and budgetary surpluses, because other countries in Europe keep buying their stuff. Of course, if these other countries DON'T keep buying German stuff, the German economy will also go down the tubes really fast, but that fact keeps getting ignored. One country's surplus is another country's deficit, after all. So what has happened to all of the surplus money? German banks went and bought up a lot of the debts of other European countries (Sovereign bonds), and in the case of Greece, Italy and Spain, their value is going away fast. And unless some means of recycling this money is arranged, real fast, things will seize up fast, especially in the investment banking (and that's what finances wind projects) sector. It affects America significantly (some of our banks are also in deep trouble with Sovereign bonds) because most American big banks no longer "do" project finance - in this country, that task is mostly done by European banks. "Oops" is not just for Rick Perry these days...
The last area of growth in Europe largely untouched by the man-made Eurodebt crisis seems to be offshore wind projects. There is something like $US 30 billion under construction, and a tremendous amount of the construction infrastructure has been built. And now that Germany is dumping its nukes, offshore wind is one way that hope to close the gap. Rumor has it, Korea and japan will soon be following suit - dumping nukes in favor of offshore wind. Anyway, to get an idea of the scale of this, check out this story of how an existing 300 MW wind farm in England is getting refinanced with long term, low risk money: http://www.offshorewind.biz/2011/11/23/eib-funds-thanet-offshore-wind-farm-uk/.
Note: there is a big opportunity for a quality underwater electric transmission line manufacture - European companies can't keep up with the demand. So, any American companies want some extra business? Voltage ratings in the 35 kv and 150 kv range, power in the 50 MW to 150 MW range...
Finally, on the money front, check out this article recommended by Paul Krugman: http://pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/jep.25.4.165. It recommends a top marginal tax rate (on the really really rich/high income types) of 70% - this will push more money into things like wind turbine investments and less into useless gambling on Wall Street. That is the estimated top tax rate on rich people that will maximize economic growth for our country, and also maximize governmental tax revenues (so we don't have to feed old folks catfood in lieu of decent Social Security checks that would allow them to buy decent human food). After all, we would not like this future to come about:
from http://my.firedoglake.com/One synergistic effect with the old, soon-to-be extinct US wind subsidy system is that a 70% marginal tax rate means that you can avoid a lot more taxes for the same wind turbine investment - especially via the MACRS arrangement. And thus, high income tax rates on the super rich means more jobs for those making and installing wind turbines, as well as faster returns on invested capital for wind turbine project investors.
Who knew.... So, maybe you can write your representatives between now and Christmas...?
Images from Vestas (http://www.vestas.com)DB
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