Several business groups, companies and labor unions have teamed up to form a coalition aimed at promoting the addition of power plants in the state and protecting existing ones.

HARWICH — There could be a 50-meter anemometer tower measuring wind speed on the grounds of Harwich High School as early as this spring. But Barry Worth, chairman of the town’s utilities and energy conservation commission, told selectmen they will need to sign off on a property loan agreement for the tower beforehand.

BOSTON --A statewide coalition including business, labor and energy industry interests has formed in response to worries about rising energy prices and the prospect of electricity shortages in New England.

There's more to determining the value of wind power than knowing which way the wind blows -- or even how hard. MIT researchers studying winds off the Northeast coast have found that estimating the potential environmental benefits from wind and other renewables requires a detailed understanding of the dynamics of both renewable resources and conventional power generation.

MATTAPOISETT -- Although the tower anchors were hammered into the ground weeks ago, the town will hold a public hearing about its proposed met tower Monday.

Last May, in a move some industry officials say contributed to her promotion to chairwoman, Judson voted against approvals for an 18-mile, mostly undersea power cable crucial to the 130-turbine Cape Wind electric generation project in Nantucket Sound, which Romney opposes.

How would you feel about a wind turbine in your community? What do you know about biomass or biodiesel? The Franklin Regional Council of Governments wants to know.

For now, towns like Falmouth and Orleans are taking their projects one step at a time and considering all their options.

FLORIDA — An appeal being heard in Boston that has blocked construction of the proposed Hoosac Wind Project here was continued last week into the new year.

Nonprofit environmental group Green Berkshires, as well as a group of Florida residents, are appealing a decision made last year by the state

There's more to determining the value of wind power than knowing which way the wind blows -- or even how hard. MIT researchers studying winds off the Northeast coast have found that estimating the potential environmental benefits from wind and other renewables requires a detailed understanding of the dynamics of both renewable resources and conventional power generation. Data show that wind-energy facilities would generate far more electricity in winter, because that's when winds are strongest. But the need for electricity is greatest in summer, when air conditioners are going full blast.

Kennedy, an outspoken environmentalist on most earthy issues, wrote in an op-ed piece in the New York Times that the proposal by Cape Wind Associates to build 130 offshore wind turbines was nothing more than a government-subsidized industrial boondoggle.

After briefly wavering, Governor M. Jodi Rell of Connecticut yesterday agreed to sign onto a multistate greenhouse gas pact that Massachusetts and Rhode Island rejected Wednesday.

Massachusetts yesterday pulled out of a landmark multistate pact to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from Northeast power plants, Governor Mitt Romney confirmed last night. Rhode Island also dropped out of the pact, according to two government officials involved in the negotiations.

A plan to build what could become the first large offshore wind farm in the United States would be effectively killed by a proposed amendment to a Coast Guard budget bill now making its way through Congress, people on both sides of the issue say

In yet another congressional maneuver that could kill a wind farm proposed off Cape Cod, a conference committee is considering language that would prohibit wind turbines within 1.5 miles of shipping and ferry lanes.

Which comes first, a set of guidelines or a specific review? That's the latest question being asked in the saga of a proposed wind farm on Nantucket Sound.

The Girl Scouts of Western Massachusetts are planning for their future with a renewable energy patch available to all ages of girl scouts.

Cape Wind Associates, which has proposed the wind farm, redesigned the 130-turbine project this year to avoid the discovered area.

The head of New England's biggest natural gas utility promised yesterday that homes and businesses across the region will face no shortage of gas for heating this winter.