....there are too many forms of subsidies and favoritism to determine accurately which energy sources get the best treatment, although some interpretations can be made. In any case, those who argue that their technology should receive more in order to compensate for another technology’s subsidies are being disingenuous. Congressional subsidies in the latest energy bill will only make matters worse.

Attached is a Wind Energy Easement Outline that discusses in some detail various provisions that can be found in wind energy easement agreements. The purpose of the outline is to give you a general idea of what types of provisions might be contained in any easement agreement or easement option agreement that may be presented to you by wind energy developers in an effort to obtain certain wind energy easements over all or a portion of your land. It is not a comprehensive discussion of the topic and is meant only to be a guide. A wind energy easement agreement, like any easement agreement, is a legally binding agreement that needs to be carefully reviewed and understood before executing it. A wind energy easement agreement will have a long term effect on you and your land. It will effect not only you but future generations. It is important that you not agree to or execute any easement agreement or easement option agreement until you have discussed it with your attorney and he or she has had an opportunity to review it. It is strongly advised that upon receiving a wind energy agreement or option agreement that you take it to your attorney along with the attached outline for his or her review.

To help guide our own internal policy on wind energy, VNRC has developed a list of criteria that we feel is appropriate to consider for wind energy development. These criteria are not exclusive to state owned land, but rather focus on developing a vision for siting wind energy infrastructure in Vermont. We have included specific considerations for State lands as well. The goal is to integrate the need to develop new in-state sources of renewable energy with protection of existing environmental values and public policy goals.

Given its location, Gray County would have displaced mostly NGCC and some oil fired generation. Using the average 2003 NGCC heatrate for the sub-powerpool (7,478 Btu/kWh) and the average CO2 content of natural gas (116 #CO2/MMBtu), the project may have displaced only 158,000 tons of CO2 in 2003 (0.00207% of 2003 US estimated emissions according to the USDOE report entitled Emissions of Greenhouse Gases in the United States, 2003 (issued December 13, 2004). (Note in 2002, the output was less and it would have displaced only 140,000 tons).

With the emergence of recent proposals, there appears to be growing interest in expanding renewable energy sources in New Hampshire. New Hampshire’s government has taken several steps to encourage the use of renewables, including setting net metering guidelines for small-scale generators (less than 25 kW) of photovoltaics, hydroelectric, and wind.1 Net metering guidelines in New Hampshire require that utilities purchase any electricity generated by small scale generators in excess of what they use. Further developing renewables beyond small-scale generation, particularly wind, can help New Hampshire increase the proportion of energy generated from renewable sources. In fact, developing the full potential of wind resources in the state holds great promise for helping to meet the state’s energy needs.

Lessons Learned: E.ON Netz GmbH, the largest grid operator in Germany, reports in its Wind Report 2005, that "Wind energy cannot replace conventional power stations to any significant extent...The more wind power capacity [on] the grid, the lower the percentage of traditional generation it can replace."

This response to the Dti’s consultation has been prepared by Hugh Sharman of Incoteco (Denmark) ApS, and The Renewable Energy Foundation, working in collaboration.

Hugh Sharman is an energy consultant, based in Denmark. Most of Incoteco’s work is done for and with large energy companies seeking innovative environmental solutions to practical problems. An example is its leading role in the formulation and development of the “CO2 for EOR in the North Sea” (CENS) project during 2001. During 2004, Incoteco (Denmark) ApS completed a wind-energy related study for the Danish Energy Agency that was also supported by a number of important Scandinavian energy companies. Its purpose was to find more effective uses for the large wind power surplus that is generated in West Denmark.

The Renewable Energy Foundation is a newly created foundation which has arisen from widespread and growing public concern that the current renewables energy policy is in itself unbalanced, and causing subsequent imbalances in the rest of the energy sector. REF encourages the development of renewable energy and energy conservation whilst safeguarding the landscapes of the United Kingdom from unsustainable industrialisation. In pursuit of this goal, REF highlights the need for an overall energy policy that is balanced, ecologically sensitive and effective.

Key Energy Issues to 2025

The Energy Information Administration (EIA), in preparing model forecasts for its Annual Energy Outlook 2005 (AEO2005), evaluated a wide range of current trends and issues that could have major implications for U.S. energy markets over the 20-year forecast period, from 2005 to 2025. Trends in energy supply and demand are linked with such unpredictable factors as the performance of the U.S. economy overall, advances in technologies related to energy production and consumption, annual changes in weather patterns, and future public policy decisions [see endnote 1 on page 8]. Among the most important issues identified as having the potential to affect the complex behavior of the domestic energy economy, oil prices and natural gas supply were considered to be of particular significance in increasing the uncertainty associated with the AEO2005 reference case projections.

Eric Rosenbloom reports:

"The data are gathered mostly from news articles, some from government and company documentation. The list includes proposed (and possibly rejected) as well as operating facilities. Ridgeline facilities described only by length instead of the whole area taken are not included. "

Eric Rosenbloom writes:

"Although Greenpeace's answer to wind-farm.org, Yes2Wind, includes a link to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), I was not surprised to find almost nothing from IPCC about wind power. In one 1996 Technical Paper, "Technologies, Policies and Measures for Mitigating Climate Change," wind is discussed among other renewable sources. The study is interesting.

It examines seven areas of human activity that affect the emission of greenhouse gases, especially CO2. The main topics are buildings, transport, industry, and the energy supply itself to these three areas. Also of concern is agriculture, which accounts for only 5% of human CO2 release but 50% of CH4 and 70% of N2O; forests, the clearing and degradation of which in low latitudes adds 1.2-2.0 gigatonnes of carbon (GtC) to the atmosphere per year, while mid- and high-latitude forests remove 0.5-0.9 GtC/yr; and waste treatment, which adds carbon in the form of methane (CH4)."