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Wind power catches on; towers not so popular

Seattle Post-Intelligencer|Lisa Stiffler|August 16, 2007
WashingtonGeneral

Technical glitches remain a major hurdle to the spread of wind power. The turbines need to be connected to electrical companies and people and businesses through power lines -- like the ones that link your house to the pole on the street, but bigger. The trouble is, these transmission lines often don't extend into the isolated places where the wind blows most strongly. Or if they do, there's not enough room in them to carry all the juice. And while technology has made wind turbines more efficient at squeezing power out of gentler breezes, it can't make the wind blow all the time. So energy from wind turbines must be paired with energy from more reliable sources such as dams, coal or gas plants.


When Roberta Hoctor let the government erect a 60-foot experimental wind turbine on her ranch above the Columbia River Gorge almost 30 years ago, her neighbors thought she was nuts.

Your TV reception will go fuzzy, they warned her.

Your radio will be on the blink.

You've got to keep your cattle away from the tower and whirling blade.

"I said to these people, 'Have you seen these work?' " said Hoctor, 72. "You should see how these things work before you start saying these things."

New technology, the rancher figured, took a bit of bravery and an open mind.

"Somebody has to test these things out," she said. "If somebody didn't pay attention to Henry Ford, we might not have automobiles."

The turbine worked. So did the TV and …

... more [truncated due to possible copyright]

When Roberta Hoctor let the government erect a 60-foot experimental wind turbine on her ranch above the Columbia River Gorge almost 30 years ago, her neighbors thought she was nuts.

Your TV reception will go fuzzy, they warned her.

Your radio will be on the blink.

You've got to keep your cattle away from the tower and whirling blade.

"I said to these people, 'Have you seen these work?' " said Hoctor, 72. "You should see how these things work before you start saying these things."

New technology, the rancher figured, took a bit of bravery and an open mind.

"Somebody has to test these things out," she said. "If somebody didn't pay attention to Henry Ford, we might not have automobiles."

The turbine worked. So did the TV and radio. No harm came to the farm animals.

A revolution began to stir.

Today, Washington ranks only behind Texas when it comes to the creation of new wind power. And the United States has become the fastest-growing wind market worldwide.

High oil prices, worries about global warming caused by the burning of fossil fuels and three decades of improvements in technology are fueling a nationwide race to harness more wind to light our homes and heat our showers.

Since being embraced by guinea pigs such as Hoctor, wind power has blown past other renewable energy sources -- and its use will only grow with November's approval of Initiative 937. The measure requires the state's largest utilities to get 15 percent of their energy from renewable sources by 2020.

Yet even with the new push, wind power still meets strong resistance.

Opposition over turbines has surfaced for projects scattered around the nation -- a trend that could intensify as remote sites quickly are snatched up.

Residents and landowners say the machines -- which are more than half as tall as Seattle's Space Needle -- are ugly, trashing unspoiled views and reducing property values. They're concerned about the flickering shadows caused by the spinning blades and the blinking strobe light on each tower.

They worry that the blades whap birds and bats, though fatality rates vary. A recent study by the National Academy of Sciences concluded that pesticides and collisions with cars and buildings killed more birds and bats than turbines.

In the Kittitas Valley between Cle Elum and Ellensburg, developers have tried for five years to get approval for a wind farm.

Kittitas County commissioners sided with a group of residents opposed to the 65-turbine project, ruling last year that the proposed wind farm was incompatible with local zoning rules. The state Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council recently reversed that decision, recommending approval of the wind farm, which is being proposed by Portuguese-owned Horizon Wind Energy.

After being asked by Gov. Chris Gregoire to take a second look at the project, the council last week recommended it again, but with revisions that could put the turbines farther away from some homes.

Gregoire has two months to either approve or reject the proposal.

The sound of the future

If the Kittitas project is built, it could become the eighth wind farm east of the Cascades.

The newest is Puget Sound Energy's 127-turbine, Wild Horse wind farm, set on 9,000 unpopulated acres northeast of Ellensburg.

On a recent afternoon, hundreds of snow-white blades spun hypnotically, rising above the sagebrush and yellow and fuchsia wildflowers.

The turbines "whoosh, whoosh, whoosh" as they spin. They're quieter than you'd expect for a blade longer than a wing on a Boeing 747.

"That's kind of a surprise to some folks -- that you can have a normal conversation," utility spokesman Brian Lenz said as the blades spun overhead.

Gusts on top of the ridge can snatch your breath away, though the turbines reach maximum power only a fraction of the time. Still, Wild Horse can produce enough power for 55,000 homes.

In combination with its Hopkins Ridge site in southeast Washington, the utility is generating nearly 5 percent of its power from wind.

The "whoosh" of the blades may be the sound of the future. But right now it's only a whisper compared with other energy sources.

Wind power totaled less than 1 percent of electricity generation last year both nationally and statewide. Dams produce 69 percent of Washington's power.

Technical glitches remain a major hurdle to the spread of wind power.

The turbines need to be connected to electrical companies and people and businesses through power lines -- like the ones that link your house to the pole on the street, but bigger.

The trouble is, these transmission lines often don't extend into the isolated places where the wind blows most strongly. Or if they do, there's not enough room in them to carry all the juice.

And while technology has made wind turbines more efficient at squeezing power out of gentler breezes, it can't make the wind blow all the time. So energy from wind turbines must be paired with energy from more reliable sources such as dams, coal or gas plants.

This rancher's convinced

Hoctor's five-story-tall wind turbine eventually stopped spinning. Her knees -- now both artificial -- stopped bending easily.

She has sold off most of her 450 acres and all of her livestock -- she said goodbye to her last goat in June.

But her passion for wind power has not taken flight.

Hoctor recently upgraded, buying a new $11,000 turbine from Seraphim Electric Co., a Goldendale business that sells residential-scale wind and solar power devices.

"I think wind power is going to be the only way to go pretty soon," she said. With wind, "we're not using up resources. The wind's here, and why not use it?"



Source:http://seattlepi.nwsource.com…

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