A bill introduced last spring seeks to prohibit offshore wind in the Great Lakes. Rep. Ray Franz, R-Onekama, is the primary sponsor ..."We don't believe the Great Lakes should be industrialized," said Jennifer Smeltzer, the legislative director for Franz. "Industrialized wind turbines in the Great Lakes affects shipping, it affects fishing."

The federal government is about to open up to wind energy development vast swaths of deep ocean waters, and states and wind park developers are vying to be the first to seize the new frontier. Wind parks in these waters can generate more energy than nearshore and onshore sites, they don't ruin seascape views, and they don't interfere as much with other ocean activities. ...Some groups say the rules leave too many barriers for developers to overcome. "Are these waters really open?" asks Sean O'Neill, founder of the Ocean Renewable Energy Coalition. O'Neill says the leases may be prohibitively expensive and the environmental review process too extensive.

The state has decided that the waters off Plum Island and Salisbury Beach aren't prime areas for renewable energy projects, like offshore wind turbines. The region doesn't have adequate tidal energy for tide-powered turbines, and it isn't being seriously considered for an offshore wind turbine farm, according to the final version of an ocean management plan released by the state earlier this week.

Offshore wind power may have the capacity to help the state free itself from its dependence on foreign oil, but plenty of Mainers have concerns as well as hopes about its potential. More than 70 people gathered Tuesday night at the Samoset Resort for the last in a series of information sessions about several proposed test sites for offshore wind power generation held throughout September along the Maine coast. Many of them, including Margaret Schuler of Edgecomb, shared their opinions ..."Why would we lay waste to some of our best and most beautiful areas for a test site?" she asked.

While offshore wind-energy projects have been slow to get off the ground elsewhere in the United States, two Louisiana businessmen quietly have been making history off the Texas coast. Herman Schellstede and Howard Schoeffler and their company, Wind Energy Systems Technologies LLC, have received the first permit issued in the United States to build offshore wind towers to produce electricity. Last month, the company finished putting up a 280-foot tower with 17 instruments to test, among other things, the wind, waves and bird deaths.

Don’t hold your breath waiting for wind power off the Georgia coast. Georgia Tech and Southern Co. have been looking into a possible wind project, but increasing costs for the turbines along with a stalled regulatory process make it an unlikely prospect for the near future, said William Bulpitt, senior research engineer with Georgia Tech’s Strategic Energy Initiative. “The main stumbling block is economics,” he said. “The price of steel and copper have gone up dramatically.”

A project that could involve the town in the Bluewater Wind offshore wind farm project has been proposed, and officials and residents are looking at possible plans with careful eyes. Bluewater is planning to construct a wind farm several miles off the coast of Rehoboth Beach in the coming years.

Gamesa and a development partner are suspending further development of an offshore wind turbine off the coast of Virginia, citing the massive amounts of capital needed to pursue a project with a cloudy future due to uncertain federal support.

Two members of the Oswego County Legislature's Economic Development and Planning Committee opposed moving a resolution to the full floor in opposition of an offshore wind tower project proposed by the New York Power Authority. NYPA has issued a request for proposals for the construction, siting and operation of wind turbine facilities in Lake Erie and/or Lake Ontario's eastern basin that would include inland transmission lines. The project is said to be the first freshwater offshore wind project in the nation.

Turbines spinning in the breeze out in the lake could become a reality, if a massive offshore project moves ahead. ...If approved, the 1,400-megawatt project would be constructed on submerged Crown lands in Lake Erie, more than two kilometres from the shores of such communities as Leamington, Kingsville, Wheatley and Cedar Springs.

Tests on a floating platform technology for wind turbines in federal waters off the coast of Massachusetts will have to wait for the time being. U.S. Minerals Management Service director Randall Luthi announced yesterday that sixteen sites around the country have been selected where companies may compete for leases to collect data and test technology for renewable energy projects. Waters off the Bay State's coast were not among the areas selected. ..."It really has no affect on us," said Martin Reilly, spokesman for Blue H. Because Blue H submitted their proposal later in the nomination process than other applicants they could not be considered in this first round, he said.

Madrid has passed legislation to allow the installation of offshore wind parks along Spain's 4,000 kilometres of coastline. The move has been enthusiastically applauded by supporters of renewable energies but slammed not only by conservationists who fear the turbines will prove to be a chain of offshore eyesores, but by fishermen as well who are deeply concerned about the effect they will have on the local fishing industry.

A report detailing the findings is due to be released in July, but Department of Environmental Protection officials said that preliminary findings show there would be "negligible impacts to bird, fish and marine mammal life." The $7 million, two-year study looked at marine life over 75 miles from Barnegat Bay to Cape May and delved into how it may be affected by turbines.

Offshore wind-energy installations in Northern Europe have lost appeal among financiers because of increased costs and difficulties in building and running equipment miles at sea, a German banker said. Many lenders have stopped providing credit for installations that are anchored to the ocean floor, said Thiess Harder-Heun, a director at Deutsche Kreditbank AG, which has financed construction of about 700 wind turbines over the past decade.

Offshore wind projects can suffer delays and cost overruns because of difficulties with maritime installation, which could make a bond a tricky sell. The risk to investors is that the project isn't built in time, or that it generates less revenue than forecast. ...It is unclear how a Cape Wind bond would be rated, but junk bonds have been popular recently.

The move comes as Deepwater steps up efforts to build an eight-turbine wind farm in state waters off Block Island that would serve as a test project before the company’s 100-turbine proposal in federal waters farther off the Rhode Island coast.

Ministers are planning to boost efforts to establish large numbers of windfarms off the Westcountry coast in a bid to massively increase the amount of renewable energy that the region produces. Rules for licensing offshore turbines and tidal power generators are expected to be relaxed as part of a series of measures to tackle the threat of global warming. But the moves will be coupled with extra protection for the most endangered marine habitats, with up to 90 "no-go" zones across the country. Falmouth Bay in Cornwall and Lyme Bay in Devon are among the areas which could be considered for the new protections.

... a Long Island man who has crunched offshore wind farm numbers says it's unclear from Bluewater's financial documents how it intends to accomplish that and remain financially viable. ...But Delmarva is a reluctant participant, having been forced by four state agencies to negotiate with Bluewater. Delmarva officials have fretted about the cost of wind power to their ratepayers, pointing out that the Long Island project is on the brink of being canceled because it cost too much. Bluewater spokesman Jim Lanard said his company will be able to build wind projects "considerably cheaper" by paying less for the same types of components. Lanard said Bluewater can beat Long Island wind farm developer FPL Energy's price on turbines, labor, ship rentals and installation costs. ...The Bluewater contract includes "escalators" for increases in the price of commodities such as steel, copper, aluminum and lead, to cover increases during the two-year period between the time the contract is signed and executed. ...A more important hedge would be to account for increases in the cost of finished turbines, but that's missing from the term sheet, Dale said.

Stuart Young, a consultant for Communities Against Turbines Scotland and chairman of Caithness Windfarm Information Forum, said: "They are going to be in people's eyes and in their windows. It will be inescapable. They will be a blot on the landscape which will be left for future generations to deal with."

A scheme to build a multi-million pound windfarm featuring up to 108 turbines off the north Norfolk coast has gone on public display.