With a majority of St. Lucie County commissioners opposing Florida Power & Light Co.'s plans to put three giant wind turbines on conservation land at Blind Creek Park, that part of the nine-windmill project is dead. Three cheers. The project does not belong on land the county and state paid to preserve. ...St. Lucie's rejection would leave intact the principle that land bought for conservation is meant to be preserved. If FPL proceeds with the project on its own land, it should return a portion of the grant. If FPL drops the whole project, the whole grant should go back to the state.

So it's dead - or on life support, at best. The news that three county commissioners went public this week against the Florida Power & Light Co. wind turbine project on Hutchinson Island effectively seems to have killed the idea. All we're lacking now is the official obituary. Paula Lewis was the latest to make up her mind, following Doug Coward, but it was the project's chief proponent - Chris Craft - who turned a few heads Tuesday when he announced his opposition.

Gov. Crist has committed the state to developing "green" energy that doesn't harm the environment. Now, he must direct state agencies, especially the Department of Environmental Protection, to stop approving little-tested technologies without setting standards. ...Last week, the state correctly backed off a hasty push to approve Florida Power & Light Co.'s request to build three, 40-story wind turbines on St. Lucie County public beaches. Even a planned April meeting is too soon to reconsider. FPL already plans six wind turbines on its own land. FPL has a booming wind business in other states, where turbines are inland, but little experience with coastal turbines.

"This is a test. This is only a test ..." The test I refer to involves FPL, its push for electricity-producing wind turbines on public land next to its nuclear plant, and the way government played along at first but now appears splintered. We have three players in this drama: the county, the state and, of course, FPL. Watching the trio dance, occasionally stepping on each other's toes, has been intriguing.

Our parks should remain quiet preserves; Kennedy Space Center's security shouldn't be compromised. Even our landfills should be off limits to FPL. Private industries have no right to generate profits on public property that only their shareholders will enjoy. Solar power is local by nature. It's time for municipalities to get behind start-up companies that can keep energy dollars circulating within their community and get FPL off public assistance.

The public has not received assurances, much less data, as to whether these turbines can withstand hurricanes. The review process itself started off on the wrong foot. All but one St. Lucie County commissioner tried to rubberstamp this project without public comment or confident data. Florida Power & Light told the community at the coal plant hearings there wasn't enough wind here to be productive, presumably to get their coal plant. FPL seems only to be looking at the price of land - not at science.

The news last week that Florida Power & Light has abandoned a quest to site wind turbines on St. Lucie County public beach land must have come as a relief to some. To the rest of us, it provided more questions than answers. Why, for instance, would FPL now subject itself to even more environmental scrutiny on state-owned land? Wouldn't that put back their timetable even more than using county-owned sites? And why is FPL only looking at a grand total of nine windmills here? Look at their other wind farm operations in Texas and California, where turbines number in the hundreds or thousands. ...I still don't get it. Our tiny project will never generate enough juice to make a dent in demand. Folks in St. Lucie aren't happy at using public land for windmills. Yes, we might find out that Florida wind is strong enough, but the scale is all wrong even if that's the case.