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Policymakers and landowners in the Great Plains are growing increasingly
enthusiastic about a European idea: distributed clusters of one
to five large (100 to 500 kW), locally-owned, electricity-generating
turbines. In the following REPP Issue Brief, consultant John
Dunlop suggests that wind clusters should complement the large,
multi-unit, professionally developed windfarms that today produce
most American windpower. Mr. Dunlop asserts that in coming years,
wind clusters will allow American communities, cooperatives and
families to harness indigenous wind resources and thereby generate
electricity, protect the environment and stimulate the local economy.
REPP welcomes this paper for the encouraging tidings it brings
to the wind industry, currently bedeviled by bad news. While
windpower has surged around the globe, net installed capacity
in the United States has merely held steady since the early 1990s,
even though the wind industry has progressively lowered costs
and improved machines. One of the few recent wind stories carried
by the general news media concerned the bankruptcy of Kenetech
Windpower, formerly the nation's largest wind firm. We find Mr.
Dunlop's report of wind cluster development in the Great Plains
heartening, and are encouraged by news of a recent Department
of Energy distributed wind initiative.
Mr. Dunlop's paper should interest electric utilities pondering
an uncertain future. As the American electric system introduces
greater retail competition, all types of electricity suppliers,
including municipal utilities and consumer-owned cooperatives,
will struggle to retain customers. Because most Americans do
not think of electricity as a consumer product, many firms will
find it difficult to establish customer loyalty to their brand
of power. Some companies will compete on price alone. Others,
however, will find a powerful marketing strategy in linking energy
services in customers' minds with local economic development and
a clean environment. We expect that these energy pioneers will
search for ways to facilitate wind cluster development.
Wind clusters constitute not only a clean energy technology but
an apt rural development tool. Because they can be integrated
into existing land use, wind clusters provide agricultural cooperatives
or farming and ranching families with an extra source of income.
Wind clusters also represent a business opportunity for impoverished
areas that want to grow economically without damaging the environment.
By casting clean energy as a farm product, the environmental
community can fashion valuable political alliances with groups
endeavoring to preserve family farming and ranching.
We thank John Dunlop and REPP's Managing Editor, Susan Conbere, for their efforts in producing this paper.
Adam Serchuk and Alan Miller November 15, 1996
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