ASSOCIATED PRESS
COLUMBUS - Environmental advocates are seeing
dollar signs in the hundreds of windmills they envision sprouting on
the Ohio landscape, thanks to the commitment to renewable resources in
the state's new energy plan.
Gov. Ted Strickland proposed that Ohio utilities be required to have
12.5 percent of their total power portfolio come from renewable
resources, such as wind, solar, and water, by 2025.
The House version of Mr. Strickland's bill spells out the percentages
each utility must achieve each year, beginning in 2009, when they must
draw 0.25 percent from renewables.
The Senate yesterday unanimously approved changes the House made,
sending it to Mr. Strickland, who likely will sign it next week.
The 12.5 percent requirement translates into an investment of at least
$12 billion in wind energy installations, according to the American
Wind Energy Association, an industry trade group. Most of the wind
farms would be in Ohio, a key to Mr. Strickland's desire for homegrown
power sources, the association said.
A study last year by the advocacy group Environment Ohio found that if
the state's utilities' use of wind power jumped to 20 percent by 2020,
it would create the equivalent of 3,100 jobs and would put about $8.2
billion into Ohio's economy. Property owners also would profit by
leasing their land for wind farms, the group said.
Renewable energy delivery systems could be made in abandoned factories,
closed because of the slide in Ohio's manufacturing economy,
Environment Ohio Director Erin Bowser said.
"We basically looked at what would happen if we met our need for
electricity with wind energy rather than stay the course," Ms. Bowser
said.
"There are already more than 100 companies based in Ohio that in some way, shape, or form are creating [energy] jobs."
Ohio has one working wind farm, consisting of four turbines near
Bowling Green. It generates enough electricity to power 3,000 homes,
the city says.
However, wind is on the move. Ohio becomes the 25th state, along with
the District of Columbia, to enact mandatory renewable energy policies.
Last year, wind generation accounted for 30 percent of all new
generating capacity, with an investment of $9 billion, the association
said.
Wind trailed only natural gas as the leading source of new capacity.
Wind power has a drawback in Ohio - a lack of steady winds outside the
relatively flat northwest part of the state and Lake Erie.
But solar power also is likely to take off, Ms. Bowser said. It is
another fledgling industry in the U.S. but is flowering in such
countries as Germany, she said.
"We may have more wind turbines going up, but the whole northwestern
part of the state is in position to manufacture solar panels," she said.
