Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
tax credit did little to inluence installed capacity until 1980-1981, when
California's two largest utilities—Paciic Gas and Electric Company (PG&E)
and Southern California Edison Co. (SCE)—responded to US$100 per barrel
oil prices by voluntarily adopting plans to encourage wind power develop-
ment. PG&E announced a target of 120 MW of wind power by 1990, and
SCE signed a letter of intent to develop a 320 MW wind farm. Due in large
part to the competition between these two irms for leadership in green
energy, a “wind rush” developed in California and by 1982, California was
host to over 1000 wind turbines. By 1985, half of the world's wind power
production came from the Altamont Pass Wind Farm alone and by the end
of 1986, about 6,700 turbines were in operation in Altamont.
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In the early 1980s, there was another notable state that began to lay the
foundation for wind power development—Iowa. In 1983, the state intro-
duced a renewable energy standard that required investor-owned utilities
in the state to purchase 105 MW of wind power. his renewable portfolio
standard (RPS) was the irst in a successive line of development policies
that would lead Iowa to become the state with the third most installed wind
power capacity in the nation.
What transpired in California and Iowa in the early 1980s epitomizes the
historical importance of state policy in catalyzing wind power development
in the United States. States like Texas, California, Iowa, Illinois, Oregon,
South Dakota, North Dakota, Minnesota, and Wyoming all have achieved
success from proactive wind power development policies that leveraged fed-
eral policy to achieve more optimal results.
By late 1985, oil and natural gas prices were once again declining and a
political debate had emerged within the US Congress in regard to extend-
ing the federal tax credit that was due to expire at the end of the year. In
the end, renewable energy proponents were unable to convince Congress
to grant an extension and were only successful in extracting a transitional
concession which allowed tax credits for projects started beyond 1985, pro-
vided that a power purchase contract and a wind farm site were procured
by the end of 1985.
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Consequently, 1986 marked the end of the irst boom
period for wind power in the United States. Between 1980 and 1986, 1257
MW of wind power capacity was installed in the nation; it would take 14
more years to replicate this feat.
In 1989, with the knowledge that costly and unreliable domestic wind
turbines were contributing to phlegmatic wind power growth, the fed-
eral government published the Renewable Energy and Energy Eiciency
Competitiveness Code, which included goals to improve design standards
to create more reliable and eicient wind turbines. Speciic goals for the
Wind Energy Research Program stemming from this code included targets
