Blowing in the Wind - Maine's electricity 10th most expensive in the U.S.

By Randall Poulton | Nov 23, 2018

A few weeks ago, my wife and I were scheduled to attend a family soiree at a historic lodge on Webb Lake, near Mount Blue State Park. Since we had not spent much time in this area before, we arrived early to allow time for some sightseeing.

The highlight was a stunning vista from Linda Bean’s farm, looking south across white-capped Webb Lake. The blue water, surrounded by spectacular fall foliage, with Saddleback Ridge as the backdrop, provided the type of panorama that is classic Maine.

Except, along the mountain ridge stood 12 wind turbines. Interestingly, on this fine, windy, fall day, only 10 windmills were at work; the other two looked damaged. One only had two blades. Apparently, the wind giveth and the wind taketh away!

The view certainly piqued my curiosity about wind power in Maine. Here are some interesting facts from the Energy Information Administration:

In 2017, Maine generated about 11.2 gigawatt hours of electricity (a gigawatt is 1,000 megawatts). This is a ranked list of Maine’s generation by so........................................

Read the full article here:

https://waldo.villagesoup.com/p/blowing-in-the-wind/1790136

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Comment by Penny Gray on November 23, 2018 at 5:06pm

Oh and incidentally, if all the blades fell off the Saddleback turbines and the towers crumpled to the ground, I'd move back to the land I truly love and never thought I'd ever leave.

Comment by Penny Gray on November 23, 2018 at 5:05pm

Forgive an ignorant question, but if a Maine wind developer lands a power purchase agreement with southern New England and can't meet energy obligations because of poor wind quality or turbine maintenance issues, what happens then?

Comment by Dan McKay on November 23, 2018 at 4:27pm

ISO-NE ANNUAL REPORT 2017 :

   "The Maine load zone had the lowest average prices in the region in 2017. Maine’s prices averaged $0.86/MWh and $2.55/MWh lower than the Hub’s prices for the day-ahead and real-time markets, respectively. Maine tends to be export-constrained, and therefore cannot export all of its relatively inexpensive power to the rest of New England because of transmission constraints. "

      Natural Gas-Fired plants, even though in-state plants generate about half of what they did in 2002, still set the price of electricity most of the time and wind is a price taker.   

 Often, one to three turbines upon Saddleback aren't turning which is probably because the market doesn't need the power or it is export-constrained. Don't know about broken blade ?

 

Maine as Third World Country:

CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power

 

Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.

Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT

******** IF LINKS BELOW DON'T WORK, GOOGLE THEM*********

(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/

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Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law

Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future

"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."

https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/

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