The Maine Department of Environmental Protection on Tuesday gave conditional approval for a $120 million windmill project on town hills. That means Record Hill Wind LLC could get the go-ahead for its 50.6-megawatt development on Aug. 20, the day DEP Commissioner David Littell will render the final licensing decision on the company's pending site plan review permit, project manager Beth Callahan reported in an e-mail.

In one of the longest and best attended annual town meetings in recent history, nearly 150 voters Monday rejected two articles, one to explore wind power and the other to develop a road plan. ...This was the second time voters had rejected the plan by a narrow margin. At a special town meeting in April, the article was defeated by four votes. At a hearing Monday before the annual town meeting, Selectman Mark Silber discussed how property taxes could be reduced by using the only resource Sumner has: Wind. He pointed out that the town is financially stressed.

Residents here will soon have a chance to vote on whether they want to have wind turbines erected at the town's transfer station. Earlier this year an alternative and renewable energy company called Ra Power expressed an interest in erecting wind turbines at the transfer station, which is located on Nebraska Road.

State regulators rejected arguments Thursday that the Maine Department of Environmental Protection rushed through an application for a 40-turbine wind-energy facility in the Lincoln Lakes region. ...the Board of Environmental Protection sided with the DEP ...Several board members acknowledged, however, that Maine may have to revisit its regulations on sound levels partly in response to ongoing concerns about noise from wind farms.

The Friends of Lincoln Lakes will argue on Thursday that political pressure from the Baldacci administration forced the Maine Department of Environmental Protection to issue a permit far too soon for the proposed $130 million Rollins Mountain wind farm, its attorney said. Bar Harbor lawyer Lynne Williams ...said she and her clients believe DEP officials ignored "a lot of really important evidence" in their rush to comply with new state laws that fast-track industrial wind site proposals.

The Lincoln Board of Appeals had no business refusing to hear a landowners group's appeal of a permit issued to a proposed $130 million wind farm on Rollins Mountain, the group's attorney said Wednesday. Friends of Lincoln Lakes attorney Lynne Williams argued in Penobscot County Superior Court that Lincoln's appeal process was chaotic.

An appeal of a local board's decision to reject a property owners group's protest of a permit issued for a $130 million industrial wind site on Rollins Mountain will be heard in court next week. Attorneys for both sides will present arguments in Penobscot County Superior Court in Bangor at 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, July 29, Town Manager Lisa Goodwin said.

A 2- to 3-mile section of the Saddleback Mountain ridge in the northeast section of Rumford could become the area's newest wind turbine farm. Andy Novey, project manager for Patriot Renewables of Quincy, Mass., said Thursday that the first season of environmental studies of bird migration patterns and visual surveys has been done. The company will complete a second set of similar studies in September and October.

Kean Project Engineering President Kirk Nadeau pulled his application for three wind turbines on Streaked Mountain, after Planning Board members and residents expressed doubts about the project. The application was due to be signed by Code Enforcement Officer Glen Holmes on Tuesday.

Ninety-two people signed a petition that asks selectmen to convene a special town meeting vote to rescind previously approved changes to town law allowing wind power facilities, according to Town Clerk Nina Hodgkins. At Tuesday night's board meeting, selectmen accepted both the petition and a letter from Record Hill Wind LLC principal and former Maine governor Angus King.

Plans for a commercial wind farm off Route 236 have been grounded. Ra Power Solutions, a Cape Neddick-based renewable energy company, recently completed a study indicating wind speeds are insufficient to power a set of turbines. The company was exploring building a small-scale "niche" wind farm consisting of up to 300-foot high turbines on a ridge across from Marshwood High School.

The Record Hill wind project continues to divide residents and raise questions about the role of wind as an alternative energy source in Maine. "Wind turbines do not belong in Maine's mountains, period," Steve Thurston wrote in an e-mail. Thurston, a private contractor and Vermont resident, owns property near Roxbury Pond in the vicinity of where the turbines will be sited pending Maine Department of Environmental Protection approval.

After a sorely disappointing eight-month trial period, the town of Kittery, Maine, is shutting down the 50-kilowatt wind turbine it installed at the Transfer Station last fall. Real-time data from the 124-foot turbine shows that it generated less than 15 percent of the electricity expected between October and May.

The Planning Board has scheduled a public hearing on June 23 on a proposal that would allow temporary towers for wind meters throughout the city. But the idea is running into opposition from residents and even some Planning Board members. ...Although city administrators are presenting the proposal as a simple means to research, residents and some Planning Board members fear that putting a wind meter on a 100-foot tower is an inherent precursor to a turbine.

Members of the council voted to authorize Town Manager Jon Carter to accept money coming in from Colorado-based Entegrity Wind Systems in the total amount of $191,028, after the wind turbine installed by the company last October delivered only 15 percent of its promised electricity yield.

Gov. John Baldacci and the state's congressional delegation asked U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu on Friday to allocate $20 million to fund a wind research center in Maine. The proposed National Deepwater Offshore Wind Research Center would include a facility at the University of Maine and a coastal and offshore test center.

Eight months after installing a 50 kilowatt wind turbine on top of a hill at the Kittery Waste Transfer Station town officials have chosen to call it quits on the alternative energy project due to its "underperformance." Town Manager Jon Carter announced Tuesday the town will look to sell the turbine back to the manufacturer, Entegrity Wind Systems, and will in turn recoup the $191,028 in funds used for the turbine, the tower and installation costs.

A wind turbine at the Kittery transfer station will be removed and the town will be reimbursed for its cost, after testing indicated the turbine produced only 15 percent of the electricity expected. ..."I am very disappointed, but the lessons learned are very valuable," he said. "We're not going to proceed to install this sized turbine again without a clear understanding of the wind sustainability and location."

The turbine is located on a hill at the Kittery Transfer Station. When it went into operation in October, town officials expected it to produce enough electricity to save about $15,000 a year. But town Manager Jon Carter says the 50-kilowatt turbine has fallen well short of the energy production goal. Carter says from October through May the turbine produced less than 15 percent of what was expected.

As much as $50,000 in tools and equipment have been stolen from the TransCanada wind energy project site under construction in northern Franklin County, state police said Tuesday. The theft was reported Saturday.