Ed:

Actually, Texas is currently the leader in the growth in wind power right now. Why? Partly because of the way California's state bureaucracy works (or rather, doesn't work). In order to get approval for any project you need to go to two separate agencies. Details in this article.

"Despite good intentions, the result is that renewable-power projects take several years to complete in California. Compare California's 241 new megawatts of renewable power to Texas' more than 2,200 megawatts of wind energy since it adapted renewable targets in 1999."

This I think is part of the real problem:

"Texas' legislation enacting the renewable requirement was 10 paragraphs long. California's legislation was 13 pages."

Funny how the bluest of blue states is getting its clock cleaned in wind power by the reddest.

Great news! Texas as a state is ranked second behind North Dakota for wind energy potential. Their capacity is an order of magnitude larger than California's however, and their production is 2% higher so relatively speaking, there is little clock cleaning going on.

"Texas’s cumulative total now stands at 2,370 MW of capacity—enough to power over 600,000 average American homes—followed by California’s 2,323 MW. Texas edged ahead of California by adding a total of 375 MW, about half of the total amount installed in the country since the beginning of the year."

AWEA News Room release July 25, 2006

I do agree that wind could be "streamlined" in the top potential states. Namely North and South Dakota, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska and Texas. But lets be realistic, property in California is quite a bit more valuable than in the states listed above.

Ed:

Read this. Especially look up the Horse Hollow wind farm, which is the largest in the world with about 700MW of installed capacity. As of last December, Texas has 2378MW of installed wind power and another 1100MW under construction. Here's California by comparison. 2361 MW installed capacity, 565MW planned.

Renewable energy enjoys huge bipartisan support in California. But our bureaucracy strangles it.

Correction. Texas has 2768 MW

Wind power is stopped by NIMBY liberals, like Teddy. The early wind generators were too small and too costly to maintain, but the new large ones (.5 to 1 MW)make sense. They are not cheap, since the capacity factor is only about 25% due to the varible nature of wind, but even if their installed cost per realized MWh is twice as high as nuclear, they do not produce a long term storage issue. We should be building wind farms as a component of the war on terror, yet nothing is being done.

Cervus, the 65% or so ghg reductions I listed were the result technologies and will continue every year as long as that technology is still working. I spent lunch yesterday trying to find some good data on wind power share of ghg reductions. The best I could do is find that total renewable energy contribution was less than 6% most of which is burning biomass.

When the wind and solar industries start providing data on how much electricity is produced instead of how is capacity is built. In any case, windmills are being erected as fast as they can be built. I am not sure what Van wants. Why promote something that does not need promoting? Bush is not promoting windmills as a solution, because he was very successful at that. As president, Bush is promoting nuclear and improving coal efficiency to reduce ghg for making electricity.

Ed is upset because I suggested "Improving gas millage is a 0% solution” when “ This blog is largely based on the fact that improving gas mileage is the BEST solution.” Well the fact is that it was a less than 1.0 % solution in 2005. This is not as bad as it sounds. Most of the mileage improvements were made before 1990 when started counting ghg. It is a case of diminishing returns. Many of the greencar solutions will actually increase ghg while reducing other more important environment impacts.

Allow me to wade through the BS here and clarify a couple of undisputable FACTS: 1) Improved fuel economy = less fossil fuel consumed/burned = less GHG/pollution/smog (CO2, NOx, etc.) 2)Improved fuel economy = less fossil fuel consumed/burned = less reliance/funding on/of OPEC nations = improved homeland security. These are non-partisan issues and I will not waste any more of my time explaining it to you Kit, we (Detroit) should be beyond this and making it happen.

what the bozo techies cannot admit is that the solution is to consume less, much, much less, 5-10 times less;so, where's the tech for that ?

Socrates, that is easy. I will be happy to help you cut back. Hope you like beans and rice and cold showers. Just as I do not think improving mileage a small amount will reduce ghg, conservation has not been very effective. In a national emergency, rationing has worked.

There are many ways to reduce your personal consumption as well as there are many ways to reduce consumption on a national or global scale, it can be via technology for example energy efficient light bulbs, or solar pannalling, wind mills instead of hydro which last longer, water reharvesting. All of these examples would be good for the environment obviously, good for the wallet/personal pocket as they save your money, and great for the economy as they require advertising and development. just a thought.,