Tag: wind farm

November 11, 2010 General Ag News and Notes Post a Comment

Kaheawa Wind Power plan out for public review

HONOLULU – Kaheawa Wind Power II’s draft habitat conservation plan and environmental assessment are available for public review, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Tuesday.

Kaheawa Wind Power is a subsidiary of the Boston-based wind energy company First Wind, which already supplies windmill-generated electricity to Maui Electric Co.

Kaheawa Wind developed the draft habitat conservation plan in coordination with the service and the state Department of Land and Natural Resources as part of an application for an incidental take permit for endangered species.

The draft plan and environmental assessment are available for public review and comment for 30 days.

The Board of Land and Natural Resources will hear public testimony on the lease and grant of easement of public lands for Kaheawa Wind’s expansion beginning at 9 a.m. Friday at the county Department of Planning conference room at 250 S. High St. in Wailuku.

An incidental take permit is required when a development is likely to result in some harm to a threatened or endangered species. If approved, the permit would be in effect for 20 years.

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November 7, 2010 General Ag News and Notes Post a Comment

Green Power’s High Cost Scuttles Projects – NYTimes.com

Matt McInnis for The New York Times

Michael Polsky’s wind farm company was doing so well in 2008 that banks were happy to lend millions for his effort to light up America with clean electricity.
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But two years later, Mr. Polsky has a product he is hard-pressed to sell.

His company, Invenergy, had a contract to sell power to a utility in Virginia, but state regulators rejected the deal, citing the recession and the lower prices of natural gas and other fossil fuels.

“The ratepayers of Virginia must be protected from costs for renewable energy that are unreasonably high,” the regulators said. Wind power would have increased the monthly bill of a typical residential customer by 0.2 percent.

Even as many politicians, environmentalists and consumers want renewable energy and reduced dependence on fossil fuels, a growing number of projects are being canceled or delayed because governments are unwilling to add even small amounts to consumers’ electricity bills.

Deals to buy renewable power have been scuttled or slowed in states including Florida, Idaho and Kentucky as well as Virginia. By the end of the third quarter, year-to-date installations of new wind power dropped 72 percent from 2009 levels, according to the American Wind Energy Association, a trade group.

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