Tom
Breckenridge
Plain Dealer
Reporter
A German
company that knows how to harness wind power is the best candidate to judge
whether Lake Erie breezes can spin off power and jobs, Cuyahoga County
commissioners say.
Commissioners
voted Thursday to select a team led by juwi international to do a yearlong
feasibility study of building wind turbines on the lake and establishing a
wind-energy research center nearby.
Commissioners
also approved a deal with Case Western Reserve University to run the research
center, under Case's newly formed Great Lakes Institute for Energy Innovation.
Case will
kick in $200,000 for the $800,000 feasibility study. The county, the Cleveland
Foundation and the Fund for Our Economic Future will contribute the rest.
An
energy-development task force formed by the commissioners one year ago has been
pushing the wind turbine project. It would have an iconic array of up to 10 wind
turbines spinning three miles or more off the shore of downtown Cleveland.
They would be
the first wind turbines on fresh water in the world.
More
importantly, an affiliated research-and-development center would develop turbine
design and technology for an industry that's in its early stages, officials say.
That could
attract wind-energy manufacturers and suppliers to the region, with the
potential for hundreds of jobs.
That's the
hope, at least. Commissioners selected the juwi team as best among three
proposals, and will now try to hammer out a contract with the German company to
study the cost, regulatory and engineering hurdles. Thorny issues include lake
ice and bird flyways.
County
Prosecutor Bill Mason, who heads the task force, says Greater Cleveland should
"blaze the trail" on developing fresh-water wind turbines.
But the task
force also owes the community a "rational decision on whether we should do it or
not."
It will be
expensive. Task force member Richard Stuebi, an energy expert with the Cleveland
Foundation, estimated that each megawatt of offshore power would cost $3 million
to develop. That's twice the cost of on-shore turbines.
With a
project of up to 20 megawatts, that's $60 million. The juwi study will look at
potential funding sources and a business structure for the project.
Juwi's team
includes DLZ Ohio Inc., a minority-owned engineering firm with Cleveland
offices, and Germanischer Lloyd Wind Energy, a leading certification body for
wind projects in Europe. The company's legal counsel is Squire Sanders &
Dempsey.
Mason
emphasized that wind energy won't take off in Ohio unless it joins 28 other
states in adopting a policy that requires utilities to generate a percentage of
electricity from renewable sources, such as wind and solar.
On average,
those 28 states will require utilities to supply 16 percent of their energy from
renewable sources by 2019, Stuebi said.
The advocacy
group Environment Ohio released a study Thursday arguing that utilities should
supply 20 percent of their power from renewables by 2020.
The policy
would create up to 3,100 jobs, benefit farmers who would lease land for turbines
and increase the gross state product by $8 billion, the report concluded.
The group is
urging Gov. Ted Strickland to include the requirement in his upcoming proposal
on electric utility regulation.
Ohio's
utilities are not enthusiastic about such a mandate, saying wind and solar
generation will cost more to produce.
Reporter John
Funk contributed to this story.
To reach this
Plain Dealer reporter:
tbreckenridge@plaind.com,
216-999-4695
