E-mail or fax members of your Congressional delegation today and ask that they let the 1603 grant program expire
WindAction Editorial
An exclusive feature of WindAction.org
Please tell Congress: No more billions for big wind
(Posted December 9, 2010)
The pressure is on to finalize the proposed tax bill before Congress that would extend the Bush-era tax cuts for all Americans. Last minute amendments are expected in order to garner support among lawmakers who oppose the initial agreement forged between the White House and key Republicans. The worry now is whether the bill will become a vehicle for piling on more spending as the lame duck session finishes up.
AWEA and the wind industry are in a huff over the possibility that a subsidy first introduced as part of the stimulus plan (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) will be allowed to expired on December 31.
They're asking that the 1603 tax grant money (ITC), due to sunset this year, receive a one-year extension. If extended, this will add $3 billion to the deficit in 2011 alone, according to congressional tax estimators, on top of the billions already pledged in the form of production tax credits granted operating wind facilities.
Earlier this week, AWEA complained that 15,000 wind-related jobs were at risk if the ITC expired but by today upped the ante to 25% of U.S. wind-related jobs, about 20,000 jobs. As is typical, the wind lobby offered no substantiation for its figures but we know that most are temporary construction positions.
Before Congress caves to these complaints, legislators should revisit the articles from this fall that discussed how billions in grant money were squandered on projects that would likely have been built without federal funding. A preliminary evaluation of the ITC grant outlays found that 61% of the grant money distributed through to March 2010 "likely would have deployed under the PTC [production tax credit] if the grant did not exist." In many cases, money went to projects that were already under construction and, in others the wind facilities were already producing electricity.
Spanish energy giant Iberdrola Renewables, Inc., alone, received nearly a billion in cash grants.
After decades of federal subsidies flowing into big wind's coffers, the industry's appetite has grown to a point where it cannot be sustained. The upfront cash grants have only served to grow that dependency and in return, developers have no incentive to negotiate lower prices with suppliers and no financial obligation to meet claimed capacity factors.
The speed at which the industry became reliant on this new stimulus stands out and should raise a red flag for all of us -- especially our legislators.
If you agree, please take the time today to e-mail or fax members of your Congressional delegation and ask that they let the 1603 grant program expire. There are cheaper, much more effective opportunities for achieving clean energy goals without coddling the wind industry -- an industry that peddles a low-value electricity product and which, after decades of public handouts, has yet to show it can survive on its own.
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Comment
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Comment by Denise Hall on December 10, 2010 at 8:39am
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Contact Congressman Mike Michaud:
https://forms.house.gov/michaud/webforms/issue_subscribe.htm
Contact Congresswoman Chellie Pingree:
http://pingree.house.gov/contact/
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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