The three Democratic candidates for governor are heading into the final three weeks of the primary campaign nearly tied in the polls, but attorney general Thomas Reilly has won the support of the majority of Democrats from the Cape and Islands legislative delegation..... Turkington liked Reilly’s position on a number of Cape issues, from his opposition to Cape Wind to his support for environmental protections at the Massachusetts Military Reservation and for restrictions on oil shipping in Buzzards Bay.

The need for proper setbacks in Chatham-Kent between wind turbines and homes and natural settings was voiced loudly Tuesday by Chatham businessman Harry Verhey. Verhey told Chatham Sunrise Rotary Club members - of which he is a member - that he isn't challenging the use of wind turbines, but is convinced there is an urgent need to determine setbacks that are right for the municipality. "The recent proliferation of industrial wind projects will have a negative impact on the community," he said. "The massive size of industrial wind turbines conflicts with the scale and character of the Chatham-Kent landscape." ...Verhey said ads run in local papers by the proponents of wind farms aren't enough - "for the most part the public is unaware of turbine developments and locations."

Sheets of one-inch Styrofoam and thick corrugated cardboard still cover his upstairs bedroom windows. "It helped," he said. But, he says he gets his best sleep now in the basement.

Would the capacity of a proposed electricity cable from Block Island to the mainland allow for more than the eight wind turbines currently planned by developer Deepwater Wind? Block Island Power Company President Cliff McGinnes Sr. revealed at Monday's Electric Utility Task Group meeting that the proposed size of the cable to the mainland is 69 kVa (kilovolt-amperes), which surprised task group members and newly hired consultant Richard La Capra. That capacity "seems awfully high," said La Capra.

"Weather-dependent" work is underway to replace a section of the cable ...With the weather being with us we would hope to complete it in February, but there is no guarantee with offshore work." The export cable was installed by now-bankrupt cable-laying company Subocean.

Shetland’s wind farm developers Viking Energy say that the Beauly-Denny inquiry will be crucial in deciding the direction their huge renewable energy project will take in the future. The inquiry will investigate whether to carry out the proposed upgrades to the Beauly to Denny power line, which acts as a spine for providing central Scotland with electricity. If the alterations were completed, the line would feed power into the national grid from wind farms in the Highlands and Islands, such as the 600 MW Shetland wind farm being proposed by the Viking Energy and Scottish and Southern Energy partnership. Viking Energy project officer David Thomson said: “Our connection application currently needs the Beauly-Denny upgrade to go ahead. Shetland is not involved in the inquiry but we have an interest. “It could happen without the upgrade but we would not be connecting near Beauly. It would make it more difficult for us.”

Britain's first offshore wind farm - located half a mile off the Northumberland coastline - should soon be producing energy again after standing idle for more than two years. Green power company E.ON is on the verge of completing the installation of a new armoured cable which will allow the blades on the two turbines off Blyth to start turning again for the first time since early 2006.

The town Electric Utility Task Group met Friday, the day after National Grid rejected Deepwater Wind's proposed power contract, which it called "uneconomic by a significant margin for Rhode Island customers." While the fate of Deepwater's proposed eight-turbine "Block Island Farm" remains in limbo, Block Island Power Company President Cliff McGinnes Sr. told the group that he saw an opening for the town in National Grid's suggestion that a cable to the mainland was still possible without a wind farm. McGinnes urged the town to seize the opportunity.

EverPower Renewables Project Manager Mike Speerschneider answered questions of Wayne Township citizens at a meeting Wednesday night, addressing wind turbines and the possibility of turbines in Wayne Township. Speerschneider touched on issues concerning electricity, road damage, local labor and the health of citizens living near the turbines. He said the turbines will not generate a decrease in the cost of electricity for Wayne Township because there is "no way to definitively say what it's (turbines) going to do to the electric."

"Once we have a wind farm on the boundary of a national park, what next? This is the equivalent of building a Tesco in the Grand Canyon - you just wouldn't dream of it."

Cal-ISO is looking at ways to deal with 71,000 MW of renewable generation in its interconnection queue, which is more than three times the additional renewables capacity needed to meet California's 33-percent renewable energy target.

"You really don't count on wind energy as capacity. It is different from other technologies because it can't be dispatched," said Christine Real de Azua, assistant director of communications for the American Wind Energy Association.

Editor's Note:This was first published on 8/21/06

A controversial wind farm should be built between Clacton and St Osyth, according to planners. Anti-wind farm campaigners said they are disappointed with the recommendation for the Earl's Hall Farm site, off St John's Road, by Tendring Council officers but they hope councillors, who will make the final decision next week, will vote against the plans. The planning committee will decide on the application for five 125-metre-high turbines at a meeting at Clacton Town Hall at 7pm, on June 19.

The women, in a letter dated July 28, are protesting the building of 50 windmills at the source of the Grand River to provide energy for the non-Native market. The group protested the original decision by the company to acquire the land.

In a 4-1 vote Tuesday, the project came to a halt amid concerns - expressed by board members and would-be neighbors - over noise, the turbine's appearance and possibly decreasing neighbors' property and home values.

"It really aggravates me that the board doesn't bother to notify people of these things in a public way," said Christine Ingham, who attended the Wednesday open house. "And then, we get here and see there is no balanced information, just how great they think it is."

Californians voted down a proposition that would have imposed a tax on oil companies drilling in the state. Fifty-four percent of voters rejected the initiative.

Superior Court Judge Ernest Goldsmith ruled that the air board approved the larger plan to implement AB32 prior to completing the required environmental review, and that the board failed to adequately consider alternatives to cap and trade. The Air Resources Board "seeks to create a fait accompli by premature establishment of a cap-and-trade program before alternative (sic) can be exposed to public comment and properly evaluated by the ARB itself."

As California takes its first baby steps toward implementing the most aggressive climate-change policy in the country, experts debate the economic feasibility of attaining the state`s goals. Its overarching policy lies in the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, which requires greenhouse gas emissions in the state to fall back to 1990 levels by 2020. One of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger`s executive orders, S-3-25, addresses long-term goals by aiming at an 80 percent emissions reduction below 1990 levels by 2050. The state`s ability to reach these goals holds implications not only for Californians, but the rest of the nation`s climate-change policy as well, Samuel Thernstrom, director of the American Enterprise Institute`s program on culture and freedom, said at a panel discussion last week.

Brown's goal, being fleshed out this week at an invitation-only conference at the University of California, Los Angeles, is to build 12,000 megawatts of distributed renewable energy, building on and extending former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's target of 5,000 MW by 2020.