The wind power, including the cost of transmitting the electricity to Kentucky, is about twice as much as it costs KU to generate power by burning coal at power plants.
To pay for the wind power, KU plans to file an application with the Kentucky Public Service Commission, requesting permission to impose a "renewable resource clause" so it can recover the costs of purchased wind power and transmission costs.
The wind power purchase will increase power bills an estimated 92 cents per month in 2009 for a residential customer using 1,000 kilowatt-hours per month, KU said in a public notice in today's Gleaner.
KU is asking the charge to be applied on or after Oct. 31.
KU and sister company Louisville Gas and Electric Co. last month announced a plan to purchase a combined 109.5 megawatts of wind power for 20 years from Grand Ridge Energy Center in LaSalle County, Ill.,
The 109.5 MW of power represents just a fraction of KU's existing generation capacity of 4,570 megawatts.
But with increasing environmental pressures, KU is seeking to increase the amount of renewable energy in its power portfolio, spokesman Cliff Feltham said.
"Sustainable wind production in Kentucky is probably not a cost-effective way to do it" since wind doesn't blow consistently here, he said. So it intends to import power from the prairies of northern Illinois.
Wind power and other renewable energies are mentioned regularly in federal energy proposals, Feltham noted.
"It's going to be a fact of life for all power companies," he said.
In 2007, KU and LG&E announced a Green Energy Program allowing customers to voluntarily pay extra to help their power company buy more alternative energy.
That voluntary program "was met with not a whole of acceptance," Feltham said. "But it's out there."
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