By Mark Seall •
August 11, 2008
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Surrounded by water, with strong winds blowing in from the Atlantic Ocean, Great Britain is a blustery place. There’s nothing quite like an invigorating walk along the cliff-tops to blow away the cobwebs.
I was reminded of this on a recent Sunday afternoon visit to the Portland Bill lighthouse on the South coast of England (pictured), since despite the brilliant sunshine one needed a concerted effort to walk headlong into the howling wind. Talking above the constant noise of wind and sea was almost impossible, and local people tell me this is by no means unusual here.
Yet despite being a desolate place with enough wind energy blowing through every day to provide a significant portion of local energy needs, you won’t find a single wind turbine at Portland today. Nor anywhere else along the windy Dorset coast for that matter.
Texas billionaire, T. Boone Pickens, is causing quite a stir across the nation with his bold Picken’s Plan to build the largest wind farm in the nation. In fact, he has caused such a commotion, that everyone seems to be forgetting about Mesa Water.
Pickens’ company, Mesa Water, bought more than 200,000 acres of ground water rights in Roberts County, Texas. Estimating that he could make more than $1 billion [...]
By Joe Mohr •
July 14, 2008
T. Boone Pickens helps bring wind energy to the center of the energy discussion and the center of the political aisle.
Misguided Probing
I don’t think it made the 3 minute clip CBS aired, but in the full 12 minute interview Katie Couric instantly goes after T. Boone Pickens about his financial aspirations of starting a wind farm. Now I’m no big T. Boone Pickens fan, but Katie, people start companies to make money (and tycoons usually start businesses to make billions). As much as you can fault the man for funding the swiftboat attack ads against John Kerry, or fault him for his influence on the Republican Party, you can’t fault the man for starting a business and wanting to make money.
I think Katie is trying to get T. Boone to say what everyone already knows (so why even waste time probing for a confession?) which is, T. Boone Pickens doesn’t care about the environment or the economic revival of rural economies as the well laid out spinning on his Pickens Plan website would like you to believe.
T. Boone Pickens cares about money–and he’s good at making it.
So why then, poke and prod a man who will put his tycoon-ish master mind to work on an energy source that will benefit the nation environmentally and economically?
Katie should’ve poked and prodded T. Boone for what was curiously left out of the Pickens Plan.
By Pem Charnley •
March 13, 2008
The military games must stop. The ambiguities come to an end. Explanations need to be provided.
I reported in the Guardian last month that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) were objecting to wind farms in the UK because they felt the turbines interfered with military radar. The turbines were, in their words “in the line of sight.”
(Of course, were we not a bellicose little island nation, always eager to attack and interfere with foreign disputes, we wouldn’t need to concern ourselves with defense quite so much.)
I demanded answers. Demanded, if their objections were true, that there be immediate improvements in radar technology so that the UK could proceed with meeting renewable energy targets.
75 miles was the round figure given. Were a turbine any closer than that, then interference would be unacceptable, the UK’s defense at risk.
Yet, last week there was a U-turn by the MoD. A complete turnaround that must have caused wind farm planners along the east coast of England millions of pounds: financial waste caused by military indecision.
By Pem Charnley •
February 7, 2008
Wind farms - certainly here in the UK anyway - seem to generate far more heated a debate than perhaps any other form of sustainable energy.
There are three arguments against their construction: namely, their ineffectiveness per se as a means of generating energy; their apparent ruination of idyllic countryside by their very presence; and the debate as to whether they pose a real danger to wildlife.
The U.K.’s Times Online reports today that plans for at least four offshore wind farms might be in jeopardy because of objections from the Ministry of Defence.
The last-minute filing by the MoD states the proposed wind farms would lie directly in the way of
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