A company working to install a wind-power project on Grandpa's Knob in Castleton is closing its Rutland office. ...In October, the Connecticut company laid off workers in New York and stopped work at two wind farms in that state in conection with the failure of Lehman Brothers, one of its chief backers.

In a Dec. 17 letter, the federal Advisory Council on Historic Preservation notified the U.S. Minerals Management Service, the lead federal agency for permitting the proposed 130-turbine wind farm on Horseshoe Shoal in Nantucket Sound, that the MMS needs to take account of historic preservation concerns linked to Cape Wind before or concurrently with issuing a record of decision on the wind farm, and not after. ...[The] council questions whether the agency has completed key aspects of that process, such as documenting to the Massachusetts state historic preservation officer its findings on the area of potential effects on historic properties posed by the wind farm.

Avista Corp. will delay building a wind farm south of Reardan by at least two years, citing the high cost of the wind turbines. "This stuff is really expensive," said Hugh Imhof, a spokesman for the Spokane-based utility. "Why build a $125 million wind farm if we don't need it for another two years?"

Replacing the energy supplied by Vermont Yankee with 100 percent renewable energy sources could cost Vermont more than $1.2 billion ..."This portfolio of renewable resources would cost approximately $73 per megawatt hour (MWh) to develop and operate and would be more expensive than (building a) new fossil fuel generation plant," stated Scott M. Albert, a principal of GDS Associates and the region manager of the firm's Northeast office, in Manchester, N.H.

A bid to extend a controversial windfarm near a historic Banffshire castle has been criticised by Historic Scotland officials and council planning chiefs. ...Historic Scotland had raised concerns that the two turbines would have a "severe" visual impact on the unoccupied castle. ...The proposed turbine would be some 3,700ft from the castle, while the other two would be closer, around 2,600ft away.

Energiekontor Uk Ltd wants to put five 328ft (100m) turbines at Brightenber Hill near Gargrave, Skipton. A 250-strong group of residents have formed Friends of Craven Landscape and are campaigning against the plans. Craven Council has received 600 letters of objection and a 600-signature petition, but its planning committee has been asked to approve the plans.

The skyline of the Vale of Evesham will be dominated and the countryside killed if a wind farm is built in Lenchwick, a newly-formed group has warned. Vale Villagers Against Scottishpower (VVASP) are urging residents to find our more about the multi-million pound project - which could see up to 10 turbines, each 410 ft (125m) tall built in the Lenchwick area.

The Select Board decided, on a 3-1 vote, to take no position Tuesday on a small-scale, temporary wind research project being proposed for Little Equinox. The project, which is before the state's Public Service Board, would construct an 80-foot residential wind turbine on the mountain for two years for testing purposes.

After more than an hour of discussion at Tuesday's meeting, the Select Board voted to take no position on a proposal to extend by two years the life of a wind measurement tower on Little Equinox. ...Select Board member Michael Kilburn moved that the Select Board take no position because during a vote taken on Town Meeting Day in 2006, the board was directed to oppose a proposal from Endless Energy to build five 390-foot high wind turbines to produce electricity commercially.

Bears and foreign conglomerates were among some the concerns citizens from in and around Readsboro brought to Green Mountain National Forest officials Wednesday night. ...The open house for receiving public input on the Deerfield Wind Project's Environmental Impact Statement was held at the Readsboro Central School's gym. National Forest officials had released a draft if the statement for public review and comment.

The proposed Deerfield Wind project, an expansion of the state's only existing wind energy facility in Searsburg, could have a big effect on the bear population in the area. But exactly how big is a matter of dispute, with the U.S. Forest Service hedging its bets until the Vermont Public Service Board makes a decision on whether construction of the 17-turbine project would be in the "public good." The state technical hearings on the project, postponed from September, are due to start in early December. ...Forrest Hammond, a wildlife biologist and bear expert for the state of Vermont, said the bear habitat on the western ridge was so important to the regional bear population that the agency had gone on record against the western part of the project.

The city council doesn't want to see windmills surrounding Milton-Freewater. Thursday morning, about six hours before a Umatilla County Planning Commission meeting to discuss windmills, the city council unanimously approved a resolution and letter to the commission declaring its "serious concern" with windmills going up in the viewshed along the Blue Mountains. It asked the planning commission to come up with rules for where it places wind farms and power lines within the viewshed.

A Georgia family is preparing to seek state approval for three 400-foot wind turbines atop Georgia Mountain, the first commercial wind project to be proposed for Chittenden County. ...If all goes as planned, Georgia Mountain Community Wind will file an application with the state Public Service Board by Jan. 1. If the project wins approval, the turbines would be installed in 2010. The Harrisons' proposal differs from most of the dozen other wind projects in the Vermont pipeline.

Two public meetings on the proposed Deerfield Wind Project have been scheduled in November, according to Robert Bayer of the U.S. Forest Service. The first will be held on Nov. 5 at the Readsboro Elementary School and the second will be held on Nov. 6 in the Franklin Conference Center at the Howe Center. Both are from 6 to 8 p.m. Bayer said the sessions are part of the Forest Service's application process, which is in progress for Deerfield Wind, LLC, a limited liability company created by Iberdrola Renewable.

Chairman Ivan Beattie said he would have been inclined to support the project, as recommended by the Planning Commission, had it not been for a decision made at town meeting in 2006 that gave the town $150,000 to oppose a much larger wind project on the mountain. The former project, proposed by Endless Energy, would have put five 390-foot turbines on the mountain and generated 30 million killowatt-hours a year. Beattie called the two projects "different animals," but he wanted to err on the side of caution. "The integrity of a town meeting vote," he said, "is one of the most important elements of local government."

There are 11 wind turbines at Green Mountain Power's Searsburg wind facility but recently one of them suffered a setback when its nacelle (or wind turbine gearbox) collapsed in high wind conditions. ...On Monday, September 15, a blade on turbine number 10 came in contact with the tower. The chain reaction caused it to buckle and it crashed to the ground, scattering debris several hundred feet from the structure. No individuals were hurt when the nacelle collapsed. However the nacelle leaked 40 gallons of hydraulic oil on the site.

The Planning Commission made a recommendation Monday night that the Select Board review a petition by Endless Energy Corporation (EEC), NRG Systems and Earth Turbines to allow for construction of an 80-foot high, 2.5 kilowatt, wind turbine on top of Little Equinox Mountain. ...But this may not be the last wind turbine activity on the top of Little Equinox in the near future. In an affidavit in support of the petition, Harley Lee, President of Endless Energy Corporation - a wind development company out of Yarmouth, Maine - stated that EEC was still hoping to install wind turbines on Little Equinox Mountain under a proposed innovative community wind structure that would provide local residents, businesses, and other utility customers with cost effective power. An earlier proposal to install five, 410-foot high turbines at the top of Little Equinox stirred enormous local controversy in 2005-06.

A Vermont-based company is planning to construct an 80-foot residential wind tower on Little Equinox this fall. Earth Turbines, a start-up in Williston that develops residential turbines, filed a joint petition Friday with Endless Energy Corp. and NRG Systems to the state's Public Service Board to erect the turbine and continue to use the 100-foot wind measurement tower already on the mountain. ...The town was notified along with adjoining property owners through the permit process. In the application, it states both the turbine and the tower "can be removed by Dec. 31, 2010."