| Page 2 of 2 < |
Talk Swirls Over Great Lakes Windmills
Some utilities consider the technology unproven and say the financial risks and the bureaucratic hurdles are too high.
Rob Benninghoff, director of renewable and special projects for Wisconsin Public Service Corp., which supplies power to much of northeastern Wisconsin, including the Green Bay area, said the utility is reluctant for now to pour ratepayers' money into what would be a difficult approval process.
  Algoma alderman Ken Taylor and Mayor Virginia Haske stand in Haske's living room overlooking the Lake Michigan shoreline in a Friday, May 26, 2006 photo, in Algoma, Wis. Government and industry officials are set to meet in Madison, Wis., and Toledo, Ohio, this month to talk about the prospects for installing giant electricity-generating windmills out in the Great Lakes. Both Taylor and Haske are opposed to the prospect of implanting offshore giant electricity-generating windmills in the area. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, File) (Morry Gash - AP) Save & Share |
Saving options
"I see it as a high-risk proposition," Benninghoff said. "I don't know of anyone who's got any plans to do anything in Lake Michigan or the bay or anything. Not to say it won't move in that direction ultimately."
Besides having to shoulder the construction costs _ the Padre Island project, for example, is expected to cost $1 billion to $2 billion _ developers also would have to get federal and state permits.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has jurisdiction over structures in the lakes. Developers also would have to lease tracts of lake bottom from the states, and state utility regulators would have to sign off.
Hanging over every proposal would be concerns about fish, lake bottoms and migratory birds. And then there are worries about the view.
"That's the No. 1 problem we face today in getting this industry started," Musial said. "Visual pollution is preventing the country from embracing them."
___
On the Net:
Wisconsin Focus on Energy: http:/
Cape Wind: http:/