According to wind developer FPL, wind conditions over the 3rd financial quarter were the least productive in the last 3 decades in the Great Plains -- go figure. Over the quarter, wind power generation came in 38% below expected totals, down 47% in September alone.

A deflating economy has taken the wind out of a massive Panhandle alternative energy project. Tight lending stalled a $2 billion wind farm project headed by billionaire oilman and alternative power proponent T. Boone Pickens. Pickens' BP Capital delayed work on a state permit to build 170 miles of transmission lines carrying enough wind energy to power 300,000 homes.

Texas consumers and taxpayers could pay more than $2.2 billion a year in subsidies and higher transmission costs to take advantage of the state's abundant wind-generation resources, a free-market research group said on Tuesday. The state's current push to accelerate use of wind-generated electricity is "costing, not saving, Texans billions of dollars," said Bill Peacock, director of the Texas Public Policy Foundation's Center for Economic Freedom. ...By 2025, the study said the price tag could total $60 billion as Texas reaches 10,000 megawatts of wind capacity.

A tax credit driving the wind industry seemed to be on its way when the Senate approved it overwhelmingly this week, but a measure to extend it hit a speed bump Thursday in the House. The fate of the wind energy production tax credit expiring Dec. 31 is uncertain as lawmakers wrangle over two versions of the latest bill including an extension. An industry advocate found lawmakers' arguments over paying for the legislation absurd in light of billions spent to shore up crumbling Wall Street titans and a $700 billion proposal to stave off economic collapse.

Blue H's 328-foot-tall wind turbine is different from the offshore generators that have sparked opposition from U.S. coastal residents. Because it sits atop pontoons, this turbine can operate in water farther from shore, where winds are stronger and more reliable - and where it's not visible from land. ...Linowes said that those opposing onshore wind projects - which often are gigantic schemes spanning tens of thousands of acres - welcome proposals to place turbines out in the water. She calls current onshore turbines "dinosaurs" and says she finds Blue H's idea appealing because it shows "that we should look to new technology rather than bigger land-based turbines," she said.

Wind farms are becoming an increasingly popular way to generate green energy, but little is known about the ecological and socioeconomic effects of the towering windmills that have begun to dot parts of the landscape. What impact do the tall structures have on the birds and bats in the area? How do the wind farms affect local economies and governmental policy? And what do residents living in communities that are home to the farms think? Two Texas A&M University researchers have been tapped to join a study that is trying to determine those answers.

"Everything he is outlining in this plan will pad his already ample bank account," said Jerry Taylor, senior fellow at the Cato Institute, who likened the plan to corporate welfare, since it calls for $1 trillion in government investment and an extension of tax credits for wind companies that are set to expire at the end of 2008. ...Ed Legge, a spokesman for the Edison Electric Institute, a Washington-based trade association for electric-utility companies, including Duke and Exelon, said he expects consumers to eventually get a reality check on wind's shortcomings. "You can't depend on wind," Mr. Legge said. "Our customers are trained to expect the power is available and on. An intermittent source is automatically problematic, and that's what wind is right now. Wind stops blowing."

A federal clock is ticking on an ambitious Texas Public Utility Commission plan to build transmission lines to funnel wind energy from West Texas to metropolitan areas. The wind energy industry revolves around a production tax credit that expires Dec. 31. After more than one false start, there is no guarantee Congress will extend it. Expansion will halt, some warn, if lawmakers don't take action this summer. "We don't want lines to just be standing out there," Sweetwater Mayor Greg Wortham said of the planned transmission lines. Wortham is also director of the West Texas Energy Consortium. Until a turbine is producing juice -- no credit.

"You're building, typically the projects way out in the middle of nowhere, long distances from the load centers," said Lisa Linowes of WindAction.org.

Indeed, the flat Midwest is where the country's wind blows the most - the so-called "wind alley."

But cities along the coast are where the majority of people live. So getting that power to the people would mean a massive, multi-billion-dollar grid restructuring.

Plus, winds die down in the summer, when demand is the highest. Some turbines have been known to kill migratory birds. And, not everyone welcomes such a sight in their backyard.

Today, Pickens will take the wraps off what he's calling the Pickens Plan for cutting the USA's demand for foreign oil by more than a third in less than a decade. To promote it, he is bankrolling what his aides say will be the biggest public policy ad campaign ever. The website, www.pickensplan.com, goes live today. ...Of course, Pickens also has a particular solution in mind. Wind. And natural gas.

State regulators welcomed wind farms into Texas' unfettered wholesale power market through a special process to designate the best wind-power production zones and to accelerate construction of power lines -- costing from $3 billion to $6 billion -- needed to link those remote areas to more populated areas of the state. However, problems that surfaced in the Texas wholesale market as wind's influence reached a critical level this spring should be a warning for the rest of the nation, said Lawrence Makovich, vice president and senior power adviser at Cambridge Energy Research Associates. "Wind is not a direct substitute for conventional power supply," said Makovich. ...Wind is attractive if added in moderation, Makovich said. "It has a desirable environmental profile, but you want to incorporate a smart amount of wind," he said. "If you add too much, you may impose too much additional cost."

As wind power becomes more common, its unpredictability becomes more of a problem. Sudden drops in wind speed can send grid operators scrambling to cover the shortfall and even cause blackouts; unexpected surges can leave conventional power plants idling, incurring costs and spewing pollution to no purpose. ...When wind farms were less common, grid controllers could essentially ignore their varying output, as it was all but indistinguishable from natural fluctuations in consumer use.

GE Energy Financial Services, which invests in energy projects, expects to finish two new wind farms in Texas and Illinois by the third quarter of this year, ahead of any potential tax credit expiration. GE is developing the projects with Invenergy Wind LLC. The farm in Texas, east of Lubbock, will have 100 wind turbines for capacity of 150 megawatts. Mr. Howell declined to say how much the project will cost. Wind developers who can't finish their projects this year could face a second problem. Global demand for wind turbines is so hot that developers must order the equipment months in advance.

The Senate has yet to take up House Resolution 5351, the energy bill approved in the House in late February. "We narrowly defeated it a year ago," Mills said. "But we think we have the votes right now in the Senate to keep it from becoming law." The bill's funding of tax incentives for green energy -- such as the wind energy production tax credit -- with $18 billion of taxes on big oil has failed to win any support from U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, who said he supports wind energy production tax credits but doesn't like the way the bill pays for them. "Our friends on the other side of the aisle feel like they have to raise taxes in order to do it," Cornyn said. "My preference would be to cut out some of the wasteful programs in the federal government and use that savings to pay for those tax credits."

"Wind needs a dance partner," says David Hawkins, principal engineer for renewable energy at the grid-running California Independent System Operator in Folsom, Calif. ...Shortages degrade reliability and push up prices. Wholesale power prices surged to $1,055 a megawatt hour in West Texas on Feb. 26 versus $299 elsewhere in the state. In a long-planned move, Texas on Saturday raised its price ceiling to $2,250 a megawatt hour from $1,500. Two days later, it hit the ceiling for the first time as wind production again trailed off. "Demand was going up as wind production was going down, so it amplified the effect," said Dan Jones, the state's independent electricity-market monitor.

Pump jacks and wind turbines were at odds in an energy bill the House approved this week, creating a quandary for North Texas where both could share the horizon. ...But he thinks it's unfair to penalize one sector of the energy industry to benefit another, Michael Frohlich, spokesman for the Lubbock Republican, said. Increasing taxes on five of the biggest oil companies will drive up energy prices for consumers, Frohlich said. "The Democrats are shooting at big oil companies, but they're hitting Americans in their wallets," Frohlich said.

Operators of the state electric grid were left scrambling to keep the lights on earlier this week after a sudden drop in West Texas wind threatened to cause rolling blackouts, officials said. Shortly before 7 p.m. Tuesday, grid operators ordered power shut off to so-called interruptible customers, which are industrial electric users who have agreed to forgo power in times of crisis. The move ensured continued stability of the grid after power dropped unexpectedly. The shortage was prompted largely by a near-total loss of wind generation as well as a failure of several energy providers to reach scheduled production and a spike in electricity usage, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported Thursday.

Whooping cranes, one of the world's rarest birds, have waged a valiant battle against extinction. But federal officials warn of a new potential threat to the endangered whoopers: wind farms. Down to as few as 16 in 1941, the gargantuan birds that migrate 2,400 miles each fall from Canada to Texas, thanks to conservation efforts, now number about 266. But because wind energy, one of the fastest growing sources of renewable energy, has gained such traction, whooping cranes could again be at risk - from either crashing into the towering wind turbines and transmission lines or because of habitat lost to the wind farms. "Basically you can overlay the strongest, best areas for wind turbine development with the whooping crane migration corridor," said Tom Stehn, whooping crane coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

A provision in the national energy bill that has been stalled by Texas' two senators would probably boost the market for one of the state's fastest-growing sources of power: wind. ...Although wind farms remain expensive to build, they benefit from a federal tax incentive and have become attractive to both traditional utilities and green-power start-ups. But a national standard is opposed by many large utilities and several members of the House from Texas, including Joe Barton of Ennis. ...Skeptics who are against the renewable standard said that wind power doesn't need any more incentives. The technology has taken off so quickly that there is a two-year waiting list to buy wind turbines, said Sen. Pete Domenici, the ranking Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.