This practice of the government picking winners and losers…

Get real. The government only picks losers.

But isn’t the wind free? There should be enough profit margin for investment in further expansion without subsidy.

Red Creek on December 14, 2012 at 8:18 PM

It’s as free as the plan to manufacture energy using the spells from Magical Fairies……..we’re spending the most money FINDING the magical fairies….

Wind power won’t be feasible unless the price of carbon-based energy sources go way up.

Paul-Cincy on December 14, 2012 at 4:56 PM

Raising the price of carbon-based energy sources will increase the cost of manufacturing windmills. They will still need their subsidies.

At the end the Physics and Economics will always win not matter how much liberals wish otherwise…

mnjg on December 14, 2012 at 5:01 PM

Absolutely true. Unfortunately, as shown by the USSR, China other countries, you can wait a lifetime for that “win”. For the liberals, it’s always just give us a few more of your dollars and then we’ll prove it…

Addison, TX put about a dozen of those corkscrew-looking wind power things on top of their expensive new water tower last year.

They *never* are on. I don’t know why, but they are *never* spinning. Utterly worthless, and cost taxpayers several thousand dollars each.

Midas on December 14, 2012 at 6:05 PM

Back in the nineties, I worked for TXU. They had put three turbines out at North Lake in Irving. The engineers told me that maintenance cost regularly exceeded revenue on those units.

We need to end all subsidies. If you can’t stay in business without government assistance, be it a Wind Farm or a family farm, then you shouldn’t be in that business and should look for another line of work.

Fred 2 on December 14, 2012 at 5:05 PM

Yes it has. But even more so, lack of demand has reduced the cost of energy. Just as with money (inflation is low despite the unlimited money creation) businesses are not growing. Manufacturing is moribund. There is no demand for money or for energy so their costs are falling.

I do not believe the wind industry is viable long term. I do believe the wind industry will continue to get funding under the Obama Administration. Philosophy and appearance will trump economic reality. Hell, the theory got him reelected, so, why not?

So the loss of the wind power industry manufacturing workforce would be the same as those lost from the stop in production of Twinkies. Whoa, that’s some indispensable industrial powerhouse you got there.

The companies backing ‘green’ wind power are after the green on a global scale: subsidies, government hand-outs, and then leaving once the cash dries up. They are like a plague of locusts sucking on the cash until the country wises up, and then they go to the next victim until it, too, becomes aware of the fact that wind energy isn’t something to run an economy on. A few places here and there can work, yes, but on a small, limited scale… wind power doesn’t scale up.

The only place solar power scales up is in orbit. Period. You get rid of the atmosphere, get maximum capture and beam it back to earth via microwaves to rectenna farms. That is 1960′s technology and is STILL cheaper than modern day solar energy systems.

Green energy doesn’t scale up. Algae can’t scale as it is an energy recapture system where you will be lucky to recapture 10% of energy normally lost. Note that you must have a preexisting large loss base to justify re-capture and that you can’t run an economy on energy recapture. Biofuels convert, at best, a bit under 10% of the captured solar energy (well that is what plants do, no?) into liquid fuel (ethanol or methanol or bio diesel). You do just as well with solar cells to electricity… a bit better because it is electricity… and that doesn’t scale. To run the US on biofuels you need about 3 Brazils of arable land… there isn’t enough arable land on the planet to turn the US with bio fuels.

Green is a scam. Not just wind. It is just becoming the poster child of the overall scam.

And in a scam the Mark is the last one to ask ‘Who is getting scammed?’

The US taxpayer is the Mark.

The US voter is the Mark.

You are the Mark.

And you had best realize it and start waking up other taxpayers and voters, because we have become the Mark on a lot of things, way beyond Green Energy and far less solvent than Solyndra.

Wind energy companies have urged Congress for months to extend the so-called production tax credit, which is set to expire this month.

We need to end these wind energy subsidies.

rbj on December 14, 2012 at 5:12 PM

NEXT we need to get rid of the Ethanol subsidies, especially including the mandate that forces it into our gasoline!!! Ethanol means lower mileage, higher cost, and ENGINE DAMAGE!!!

IT’S TIME TO STOP SHOOTING OURSELVES IN THE FOOT!!!

The wind industry isn’t really an energy industry; it’s a part of the rent-seeking industry.