As Rhode Island moves to expand its renewable energy market, lobbyists at the Statehouse are finding the debate provides a different form of green power: cash. At least $400,000 has been spent so far this year by corporations with a stake as lawmakers hash out agreements worth big money to power developers, energy suppliers and labor unions hurting for jobs.

Because of stronger winds and a sea floor with fewer obstacles to construction, the most favorable places for wind turbines in Rhode Island coastal waters appear to be far offshore, where the turbines will be all but invisible from the mainland. That preliminary conclusion by state researchers could be extremely good news for Deepwater Wind, the company selected by the Carcieri administration to construct a $1.5-billion wind farm in Rhode Island's coastal waters. Avoiding manmade blemishes on ocean views is important because other potential wind farms, primarily the Cape Wind farm proposed for Nantucket Sound, have been criticized in large part because people didn't want to see them from shore.

Deepwater Wind LLC's proposal to build an offshore wind farm off Rhode Island has taken another step forward with the signing of a letter of intent to lease 117 acres in the Quonset Business Park to use as a staging area for the $1.5-billion project. ...The news came on the night that Deepwater gave its first formal presentation to the QDC board on the project.

The New Jersey alternative energy firm that had pushed to build three 445-foot wind turbines in the waters off Plum Island has ditched the plan in favor of a more ambitious project off the coast of Block Island. The deal breaker -- or, in Rhode Island's case, the deal maker -- was New York State's stringent regulatory process, said Chris Wissemann, chief operating officer of Deepwater Wind in Hoboken, N.J.

The state Department of Environmental Management is seeking bids from developers to construct one or more wind turbines in Narragansett. The DEM is working with the town to erect commercial-scale wind turbines on coastal land owned by the town and the state.

The state Department of Environmental Management and the Town of Narragansett are soliciting bids to build onshore wind-turbine projects. ...The state property sites being considered for the turbines are: Camp Cronin, Black Point, and property on the southwest side of the Galilee Escape Road.

President Obama's Earth Day announcement of new rules to regulate the offshore wind-power industry was hailed yesterday as a major development that will allow Rhode Island to move forward as a national leader in developing its own offshore wind-power projects. ...Without the rules, Fugate said, wind farm developers could not even erect meteorological towers that are needed to gather the three years of wind data that lenders require before they will finance wind projects.

National Grid has appealed to the R.I. Supreme Court a ruling by the R.I. Public Utilities Commission (PUC) ordering Grid to sign long-term contracts for the purchase of renewable energy. The utility argues that current law does not allow it to do what the commission wants. In its ruling on March 16, the PUC unanimously rejected National Grid's electricity supply plans for 2010, writing that "contrary to the plain language" of the commission's rulings on the subject, "the plan did not contain any long-term contracts for renewable energy resources."

Deepwater Wind, moving forward with its $1.5-billion proposal for a wind farm off Rhode Island, is seeking permission to erect a 180-foot-tall meteorological tower on Block Island to collect weather data. The New Jersey company has asked the New Shoreham Town Council to approve the temporary tower that would be put up near the entrance to the Great Salt Pond, on the west side of the island. The tower would be the first significant physical sign of the company's two-part plan.

During Wednesday's Town Council meeting, Deepwater Vice President of Development Clint Plummer said the metal tower ...would contain anemometers to measure wind speed. The company wants to place the tower on the sandy spit of town-owned land to the west of the entrance to the Great Salt Pond and north of the Coast Guard Station. ...Deepwater had initially planned to place the tower near the North Light, but learned that much of the area was protected conservation land.

People hiking out to Black Point or the Camp Cronin fishing access in Narragansett may one day find something new on the rugged and scenic coastline - large commercial wind turbines. The state Department of Environmental Management, working in cooperation with the Town of Narragansett and the City of Providence, is looking for proposals from private developers to erect three turbines in Narragansett.

Deepwater Wind took one step closer Wednesday to building a wind farm off the southeastern coast of Block Island. On Wednesday the Town Council unanimously approved a Special Temporary Permit that allows Deepwater to place a mobile radar unit by the Southeast Lighthouse to study bird patterns. The studies will prove crucial to Deepwater's plan to build five to eight turbines in an arc about three miles off the southeast coast of the island.

In 2000-plus pages, filled with studies, statistics and opinions galore, the federal Minerals Management Service concluded that building a wind farm on Horseshoe Shoal was not only better than nowhere, but better than a good many other spots. The Final Environmental Impact Statement released last week didn't say the site in Nantucket Sound was perfect, but that it met a series of physical, biological and social/human benchmarks.

The state of Rhode Island signed a joint development agreement with Deepwater Wind Thursday that could lead to the placement of four to eight wind turbines three miles off the southeastern coast of Block Island as early as 2010. The legally binding agreement envisions the wind farm providing 20 megawatts of power with a tie-in to the island.

The Barrington Town Council made it official Monday night: The wind turbine project proposed for Legion Way is off the table. ...At the meeting on Monday night, council member Kate Weymouth motioned to accept a recommendation from the Committee for Renewable Energy for Barrington to not move forward with construction of a turbine at Legion Way, "at this time."

A developer is proposing to build the first commercial-scale projects in New England waters to harness the power of the waves for electricity, but most of the energy they produce would actually come from attached wind turbines. Grays Harbor Ocean Energy Company, based in Seattle, applied for preliminary permits from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in October to explore mounting 100 jack-up platforms - similar to those used in the offshore oil industry - in seven tracts of ocean around the country.

The financial crisis is causing problems for First Wind, one of the backers of Deepwater Wind, the firm chosen by Gov. Donald L. Carcieri to build Rhode Island's offshore wind farm. ...First Wind declined to comment, but in its public filing the company warned: "If we are unable to obtain additional debt or equity financing, we may have to curtail our development activities or be forced to sell assets."

The report, completed by AWS Truewind, created a virtual met tower for the Legion Way location and shows readings for simulated hourly wind speeds, directions, temperatures, pressure and air density at 65 meters above ground level. It indicates a mean wind speed of 5.33 meters per second, which is significantly less than the previous readings town officials had collected. It also showed longer periods of inactivity for the proposed wind turbine.

A proposal that the town build a $2.4-million wind turbine seems poised to topple due to a new consultant's report showing that wind speeds at the prospective site are not as strong as previously believed. AWS Truewind, of Albany, N.Y., which initially gauged the average wind speed above Brickyard Pond at 13.4 mph, now says that the average speed per year is just under 12 mph.