As energy costs continue to soar, and an increased reliance on traditional oil and coal is questioned, alternate sources of energy are examined more closely. Many in the five largest countries in Europe and in the United States like the idea of renewable energy, but do not want to pay any more for renewable energy sources. A majority of adults who have some form of responsibility for paying household energy bills in Great Britain (54%) and Germany (50%), pluralities in Italy (44%), France (42%) and the U.S. (40%), as well as just over one-third of adults responsible for paying household energy bills in Spain (35%), all say they would be willing to pay nothing more for energy if it was from renewable sources.

The government wants 45% of the country's electricity to come from renewables such as wind, hydro, and solar by 2010. And that's just a start. "This challenge will create a new industrial revolution," Portugal's economy minister, Manuel Pinho, told the BBC. ...The campaigners are torn between their concern about climate change and their love for the wildlife. "We should have renewable power but not at any price," Joao says.

Ambitious plans to erect more than 10,000 wind turbines across Britain and around the coast by 2020 are at risk of being derailed by a critical supply bottleneck. The German engineering giant Siemens, which is one of the leading wind turbine manufacturers, admitted yesterday that it had a four-year backlog of orders for its largest machines. "Supply is indeed tight, relative to demand," a spokesman said. British utility companies have been told by Siemens that new orders for turbines will not be filled until 2012 at the earliest. The delays imperil a daunting Government target that the power industry had already deemed near-impossible to complete within the proposed time frame. ...The turbines shortage is one of many bottlenecks as the wind industry tries to cope with demand that grew by 30 per cent last year.

Prospects for the solar power sector are puzzling investors juggling on the one hand a possible dot-com-style bust and on the other fresh support in Europe, home to one-third of the world's market. The solar power industry uses the same raw material as the semiconductor industry, silicon, and may share a similar boom-bust path, according to some analysts. The semiconductor industry collapsed in 2000 amid a dot-com bust that pulled demand for electronic chips. Solar companies saw their share prices skyrocket last year, but many endured a steep fall in January, halving in the case of one market leader, Renewable Energy, which is based in Oslo. Such falls reflected a view that solar power valuations had run ahead of themselves.

Applications for wind farms that would generate more than 34,000 megawatts of electricity - almost three times the country's current generating capacity from all forms of energy - are being considered by the Regulatory Authority for Energy (RAE). At a time when the European Union is looking to strengthen its alternative energy policies and slash greenhouse gas emissions, Greece's energy regulators are apparently pinning their hopes on wind power to help meet ambitious energy targets. ...according to National Centre for Renewable Energy (CRES) president Yannis Agapitidis, within the land use plan are restrictions limiting the size of island wind farms to four percent of the area of that island. That would appear to make existing applications for farms on Skyros and Serifos, amounting to 330MW and 260MW, respectively, unviable.

GWEC figures wind power's capacity in 2005 was about 24%-that is, wind turbines spin 1 hour out of 4, year-round. That will improve, but slowly. Bigger and taller turbines, in more favorable locations-especially offshore-will make wind turbines more efficient. But it will be a long time before wind power's paper strength starts to be reflected in real electricity generation. GWEC's own figures point to wind power creeping toward 30% efficiency over the next twenty years. Wind power may be the most mature horse in the renewable-energy stable. But even a thoroughbred is going to have a tough time catching up with the supertanker that is the fossil-fueled energy establishment.

Nato has begun an investigation into British findings that wind farms make overflying planes invisible to radar as military chiefs fear a security threat from the rapid spread of the turbines. The US has been attending tests by Britain's Air Warfare Centre after it made the surprise discovery that the energy plants create blind spots in air defences. Renewable energy campaigners have been stung by a spate of last-minute objections from the Ministry of Defence to proposed new wind farms in northeast England and the Scottish Borders. Nato's alarm about this potential Achilles' heel against airborne terrorists or invaders is disclosed in evidence, seen by The Times, for a planning inquiry.

Renewable energy sources enjoy excellent prospects in Spain, but there are complaints about business practices in the energy sector and the lack of effective enforcement of environmental standards. ...The companies were allocated free permits by the state, under the European Union's Emissions Trading System (ETS), to emit up to 85.4 million tonnes of CO2 a year from 2005 to 2007. However, the energy companies passed the costs of the permits on to consumers, even though they had not paid for them. The government decreed that the companies involved should return the money, which in 2006 and 2007 amounted to 1.2 billion euros (1.68 billion dollars). In 2008 the companies will have to pay back 1.45 billion euros (1.83 billion dollars) in consumer surcharges. In the face of protests by the companies, the Spanish government replied that after the 2008 elections it will introduce a draft law to replace the decree-law of Dec. 21, 2007, now in force. This will allow in-depth debate and negotiations. The Spanish Electrical Industry Association (UNESA) immediately responded that it would not stand idly by if the proposed law upholds the demand that amounts charged for the free CO2 emission permits be repaid.

LISBON, Dec 17 (Reuters) - Power company EDP (EDP.LS: Quote, Profile, Research) will decide on the sale of 20 to 25 percent of its renewables business in the first quarter of 2008, EDP's chief financial officer Nuno Alves was cited as saying. Alves said in an interview with weekly Expresso published on Sunday that some banks had shown interest in carrying out the sale of its renewables business, which includes NEO in Europe and recently acquired U.S. wind-farm company Horizon Energy. He said EDP's renewables business could be worth around 10 billion euros.

Iberdrola Renovables SA, the world's biggest owner of wind-driven power plants, fell on its trading debut in Madrid after the 4.1 billion-euro ($6 billion) initial public offering was completed at the low end of a price range. The stock lost as much as 33 cents, or 6.2 percent, to 4.97 euros in the first six minutes of trading. Parent company Iberdrola SA, Spain's second-largest electricity generator, sold 18.2 percent of its Renovables unit two days ago for 5.30 euros apiece, compared with a maximum suggested price of 7 euros. ..."This is the first really big renewables company that comes to market, so it's acting as a thermometer to gauge investor interest,'' Soldevila said.

Tom Murley, head of UK private equity group HgCapital's renewable energy team, has warned clean energy stocks could be about to fall. At a conference held by Financial News last week, he said: "We are at the peak of inflated expectations." ...Murley, who heads the largest team of renewable energy specialists in the UK private equity market, said long-term prospects for quality clean energy companies are bright. But he compared the soaring price of clean energy stocks with the technology bull market of the late 1990s and argued innovation leads to overexuberance in stock markets. This is followed by disillusionment as competing products develop and investors realize profits will disappoint. A steady rise out of the trough follows as quality companies start to make headway.

The initial public offering for Iberdrola's renewable energy unit is unlikely to drum up enough demand to command an ambitious top price of 7 euros per share, international investors said on Wednesday. Spain's largest utility by market capitalisation is selling 20 percent of Iberdrola Renovables via a capital increase to build up the green energy unit and tap into market appetite for the trendy renewable energy sector. ...This week Renovables set the maximum retail price for the IPO at 7 euros, which fund managers said was expensive. "I don't think they'll get it at the top, I think they'll have to adjust down a little bit, especially given market volatility," said Rupert Morrell, senior fund manager at Premier Asset Management.

...global investment bank Lehman Brothers agreed to advise and finance the $700m Cape Wind project, the US’s first offshore wind farm located near Nantucket Island and a landmark cause for many environmentalists. This March, Goldman Sachs sold its investment – redubbed Horizon Wind Energy – to Portugal’s largest utility, EDP, for more than $2.1bn, making a profit of $900m. But Lehman Brothers’ project, despite early state-level approvals, has been stuck in bureaucratic purgatory from which it is unlikely to emerge soon. The problem: Nantucket’s millionaire residents oppose the wind farm, which they claim would ruin their ocean views. The contrast between the outcome of the Zilkha investment and the Cape Wind project illustrates the unpredictability of the clean technology sector. “There is no doubt in my mind that renewable energy is like other tech start-ups, where some will succeed and many will not.”

THE tiny Greek island of Serifos, a popular tourist destination, depends on its postcard views of sandy beaches, Cycladic homes and sunsets that blend sea and sky into a clean wash of color. So when a mining and energy company floated a plan earlier this year to build 87 industrial wind turbines on more than a third of the island, the Serifos mayor, Angeliki Synodinou, called it her "worst nightmare."..."These are not just one or two turbines spinning majestically in the blue sky and billowing clouds," said Lisa Linowes, executive director of Industrial Wind Action Group, an international advocacy group based in New Hampshire that opposes wind farms.

Sweden’s gleaming wind park is entering service at a time when wind energy is coming under sharper scrutiny, not just from hostile neighbors, who complain that the towers are a blot on the landscape, but from energy experts who question its reliability as a source of power. ...As wind energy has matured as an industry, its image has changed — from a clean, even elegant, alternative to fossil fuels to a renewable energy source with advantages and drawbacks, like any other. “The environmental benefits of wind are not as great as its champions claim,” said Euan C. Blauvelt, research director of ABS Energy Research, an independent market research firm in London. “You’ve still got to have backup sources of power, like coal-fired plants.”

A project currently underway aimed at connecting Malta to the European electricity grid is gathering steam, with work aimed at determining the appropriate regulatory and operating framework in progress with a view to preparing the project to move from the feasibility to the implementation phase. ...With electricity generation accounting for 63 per cent of Malta's greenhouse gas emissions, the initiative will be crucial if Malta is to meet EU climate change directives, as well as the European Commission's target of achieving a 20 per cent reduction from 1990 carbon dioxide levels. While the Marsa Power Station is due to close down, Malta is also investigating the possibility of sourcing natural gas as an alternative to the liquid fossil fuels currently in use at the Delimara and Marsa power stations.

A coalition of environmentalists and businessmen have joined forces to launch a standardized, international marketplace for trading carbon emissions credits they say will be more effective in the fight against global warming than regional efforts currently taking shape. ...For example, a wind farm project in West Virginia producing enough green energy to offset 500 tons of carbon emissions receives 500 credits. The project managers can then sell those credits in the marketplace to businesses that produce emissions. Polluting businesses are not required to buy the credits, but, Harris said, it's good public relations for a company to offset their carbon emissions and it can act as a hedge against future regulation.

Shares in renewable energy companies with assets in the US could see further declines tomorrow on ongoing fears that the US energy bill might be passed this week without including tax incentives for generators and promoters of renewable energy, market sources said. ...Yesterday, website renewableenergyaccess.com reported that the Democrat house leaders in the US are preparing to cede to demands from Republicans and remove all tax breaks for renewable energy companies from the bill in order to push it through parliament before the Thanksgiving break on November 16.

According to Malta’s autumn update of its National Reform Programme, the government is working with the German consultants on preparation plans that envisage a 200MVA electricity connection with Sicily. Such an interconnection would be coupled with more irregular sources of energy such as the proposed multi-megawatt offshore wind farm project as well as the generation of electricity from waste. ...The connection with the European power grid is integral for the emergence of the wind farm project. As the report, presented yesterday, states, “An interconnection to the European electrical network is unavoidable for the integration of an intermittent source of energy such as the proposed multi-megawatt offshore wind farm, given the stability issues that would otherwise arise in a small isolated system such as currently in Malta.”