Whenever the Senate energy committee in Lansing meets, the place is packed. Utilities, customers supporting "green" and renewable energy legislation, entrepreneurs promoting alternative energy, and people of every stripe in between jam the meeting room. Everyone is keenly interested in finding out what the Senate plans to do, but if anyone knows anything, they're not saying a word.

As the nation continues to look toward cleaner and more renewable energy sources to fuel electricity, wind energy is becoming a more viable option, and recent data suggests that Northern Michigan’s hilly terrain and proximity to the Great Lakes make it an ideal area to harvest this inextinguishable source of power. ...“The common lifestyle people only think about their energy source when they pay their bill once a month, and if their power ever goes out,” he said. “More expensive energy will get people to conserve more, and use power more wisely. We can still live a good life this way.” Yet, wind energy is not without its detractors — some residents complain of the low hum produced by the blades.

It's still in the preliminary stages...but a northern Michigan power company is researching a Charlevoix County community as the possible home to a wind turbine site. Traverse City Light and Power recently signed a real estate option and wind easement contract that could potentially lead to the construction of several wind turbines in Norwood Township. "... the planning commission has appointed a sub committee to work on the creation of that [ordinance] so we can get the towers permitted properly in our township," says Norwood Township supervisor Tim Boyko.

Committee member Glendon Brown presented the research on wind power in response to inquiries from individuals asking why the city has not considered this as a power source. The city has been exploring various energy options to meet increasing electric demands because the city power plant is 50 years old. The city wants to meet energy needs for current and future customers. "This is a preliminary assessment, not a final answer," Brown told committee members. He offered a wide range of information, including wind turbine performance specifications, turbine construction costs, wind power classifications and a summary of local wind data.

The board amended the Mason County Zoning Ordinance at its monthly meeting and eased the regulation on the amount of noise large or industrial wind turbines can produce. The amendment allowed an increase in noise from 45 to 55 decibels - a level still lower than normal conversation, which the county says and several Web sites concur, falls at about 60 to 70 decibels. Although there are currently no large industrial wind turbines in Mason County, the county's Zoning and Building Director Mary Reilly said several companies are looking ...

The rumors have blown in the wind for several years -- that green power companies were eyeing farmland known as The Ridge along the border of Kent and Ottawa counties for major wind farms. Two companies quietly have competed against each other to buy leases for wind turbines that would tower above the apple trees and pastures in Sparta and Chester townships. They could be tall enough to be seen from downtown Grand Rapids. ...Michigan is the 14th windiest state in the continental U.S. and is second to Minnesota in wind potential among the Great Lakes states. But it's near the bottom nationally in turning it into electricity.

For at least several months, Iberdrola and Heritage Sustainable Energy of Traverse City have been securing wind rights leases in several townships in northern Kent and Ottawa counties. "In the Fruit Ridge area, we've leased somewhere in the vicinity of about 4,000 acres," said Rick Wilson, project coordinator for Heritage Sustainable Energy and its sister company, Wind Energy Partners. "We're in the very early stages of investigating the wind energy development potential in that area," added Wilson. The area includes about three of the townships on the Kent-Ottawa county line. Wilson said Heritage Sustainable Energy has not yet sought permits for erecting test towers but is planning to do so for one or two towers.

As state legislators and the governor grapple with alternative energy policies governing such technologies as wind turbines, no doubt local officials also will face several thorny wind issues. Cities, villages and townships will weigh in through their zoning ordinances as the needs and rights of property owners are balanced through local land-use rules. Local governments have the power to promote or eliminate wind projects in their communities, Brion Dickens told a Muskegon Countywide planning commission meeting earlier this week. ... "If you don't want a wind project in your community, put it in your zoning," Dickens told Muskegon area public officials. ..."This is a new beast for a lot of people, especially those in Michigan," Dickens told the Muskegon planners of the land rent payments, construction jobs and tax-base benefits of wind farms. "Some areas might not want wind turbines."

"Offshore (wind turbine sites) can be a can of worms," said Dickens, who is part of the Michigan wind outreach team from the Michigan Energy Office. "We don't have to go there yet. There are a lot of inland areas that we can use for wind development." Dickens might not want to "go there," but there are plenty of people considering the huge potential for wind turbine development on Lake Michigan and the other Great Lakes. ...From an environmental standpoint, a lot more study is needed, according to Alan Steinman, director of the GVSU Annis Water Resources Institute in Muskegon. He suggests looking at the affects of such off-shore wind farms on birds and fish.

Industry analyst Emerging Energy Research projects wind energy generation in the United States to grow nearly five-fold by 2015. But a Bay City company that built thousands of wind-turbine blades found the industry holds perils as well as promise. ...A variety of reasons caused the company to exit the business, President and CEO Robert Monroe said, and it's unlikely to resume making blades. "It was way too much of a boom-bust for us," Monroe recalled. "We were taking on people who had the savvy to make blades, we'd come up to speed and then all of the sudden we were laying people off. So it was very cyclical." ...And even if turbine makers decide to manufacture in Michigan, they may only be active for a limited time, Monroe believes. "So many people want to put up blades, but once Michigan is saturated, those jobs will go away," he said.

A noise control consultant and acoustics expert urged planning commissioners here to create their own wind turbine ordinance that's tailored to the local community and more restrictive than the state's guidelines. Roughly 40 area residents, as well as some DTE Energy representatives, turned out for Wednesday's Lake Township Planning Commission meeting featuring a presentation by Richard R. James, owner of the Okemos-based E-Coustic Solutions. ...Township officials asked James to come to a meeting and share some of his expertise because they currently are conducting research for a wind overlay ordinance. Lake Township instituted a one-year moratorium on any wind farm developments during the township board's March meeting, said Lake Township Cleric and Planning Commissioner Valerie McCallum.

Gov. Jennifer Granholm last week toured the 32-turbine Harvest Wind Farm between Pigeon and Elkton in Huron County's Oliver Township. She says the sheer size alone of a turbine is an economic opportunity for Michigan. ...But one crucial ingredient is missing - a law requiring that a certain amount of the state's electricity come from renewable sources such as wind. Twenty-five states have what's known as a renewable portfolio standard, or RPS, and a few others have voluntary goals. ...Senate Energy and Technology Chairman Bruce Patterson could be key in determining the fate of renewable requirements. He says he won't stand in the way of the 10 percent requirement passed by House because there are safeguards to eliminate the mandate if green power costs too ...He also expresses concern about a Standard & Poor's report on power produced by wind. It's still an "infinitesimal" fraction of all electricity, according to the report, which last month raised concerns about the feasibility and cost ramifications of forcing U.S. utilities to comply with renewable mandates. Costs eventually show up on the monthly bills of residents and businesses.

Proposals for five new coal-fired power plants have state environmental lobbyists on fire. In sites near Midland, Rogers City, Manistee, Alma, and Marquette, companies have applied to the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) for air quality permits needed to start the construction of coal-fired power plants, as recommended by the Public Service Commission's 21st Century energy report released in early 2007. ...Should the state forgo the construction of those plants, however, it would have to depend on out-of-state electricity at a higher cost, said Doug Roberts, executive director of environmental energy policy at the Michigan Chamber of Commerce. "We want energy here in Michigan," Roberts said. ...From a jobs standpoint, more people are employed at a power plant than at a wind turbine or other alternative energy plants, Roberts said. "Power plants would provide several hundred jobs to the community that people will work in every day," Roberts said.

More than $22,000 in wind-metering equipment has been ordered and meetings begun with land owners in the Blissfield area, where property may be leased for a wind farm project being pursued by newly formed Great Lakes Wind LLC. ...Gould reported on progress of the wind power project Thursday to that committee. The fixed costs involved in setting up a wind generation project are so large that small projects are less feasible, he said. "You've got to get enough turbines into it to cover your costs," Gould said. One major expense is bringing in large cranes needed to mount 53-ton turbines on the steel towers, he said. Legal costs for organizing a project are estimated at $100,000, he said, regardless of the number of turbines that would be installed. Great Lakes Wind is preparing to start documenting wind power potential in the Blissfield area.

Many people raised their hands Wednesday night to say they plan to install wind turbines on their properties, or to allow a company to place a wind turbine on their property. "I've heard about those for a while and I'm interested in saving energy if we can and making it cheaper," Neil W. Nystrom of Manistee County's Bear Lake Township said about his interest in wind energy.

City officials are preparing an ordinance that would allow residents and companies to operate wind turbines. A handful of townships in Michigan have ordinances that specifically address turbines, but few cities have followed suit. Officials in the city's community development office are studying the issue as residents become interested in using alternative energy sources. ...Heights are being worked out, but TV antennae are allowed to be 70 feet tall. Maher said the city wants to strike a balance where residential turbines would be high enough to be effective without posing a threat to neighbors if they topple.

But state officials do not have a clear picture on how readily the state's electricity transmission infrastructure could accommodate the added load - a proposed 2,500 megawatts in the Lower Peninsula and 520 in the UP - from new wind-generating sources. A 2006 report from MPSC found that barring "significant enhancements," existing electric generation and transmission capacity would be insufficient to meet reliability standards in the Lower Peninsula by 2009. The MPSC is working on a study with transmission-owning companies to determine the cost of updating Michigan's transmission system. "If we do this smart, and that's a big leap of faith right there, where we see the wind being developed is where they need to build transmission anyway," said Joseph Welch, president and CEO of Novi-based ITC Holdings Corp.

Rogers City residents who have an opinion regarding a proposed wind turbine ordinance for the city will have the opportunity to speak up at April's planning commission meeting Members of the Rogers City planning commission voted unanimously during their Monday evening meeting to set a public hearing regarding the proposed ordinance. In addition, a six-month moratorium was passed, barring all wind turbine projects within the city until the commission is able to study the issue further. "This is something that requires a lot of study and careful thought," said City Manager Mark Slown.

It was standing room only at Thursday's wind energy meeting where landowners learned information about signing leases and the potential for strength in numbers when it comes to forming a group to get the most value for their land. Steve Harsh, Michigan State University professor and extension farm management specialist, gave an in-depth overview of wind power renewable energy for the future, as well as landowner guidelines for evaluating wind energy production leases, to the roughly 100 in attendance at the Scheurer Professional Center in Pigeon.

Attorney General Mike Cox on Tuesday blasted legislation he said would significantly raise electricity prices, re-monopolize Michigan's market and not do enough to cap the cost of wind and other green power. Cox, a Republican, commended Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm for pushing renewable energy measures. But he said the effort shouldn't be tied to bills that would limit competition from alternative power companies and change the way big utilities raise electric rates and pay for new plants. No bill can become law unless the full package is signed. Cox also said Granholm is exaggerating the job-creation potential of a renewable portfolio standard, or RPS, which would require that 10 percent of the state's electricity come from green resources by 2016. "We're loading it up with Christmas lights and trying to say it's something more than what it is," said Cox, arguing than an RPS should be touted only for its environmental benefits.