Move Over, Oil, There’s Money in Texas Wind
SWEETWATER, Tex. — The wind turbines that recently went up on Louis Brooks’s ranch are twice as high as the Statue of Liberty, with blades that span as wide as the wingspan of a jumbo jet. More important from his point of view, he is paid $500 a month apiece to permit 78 of them on his land, with 76 more on the way.
“That’s just money you’re hearing,” he said as they hummed in a brisk breeze recently.
Texas, once the oil capital of North America, is rapidly turning into the capital of wind power. After breakneck growth the last three years, Texas has reached the point that more than 3 percent of its electricity, enough to supply power to one million homes, comes from wind turbines.
Texans are even turning tapped-out oil fields into wind farms, and no less an oilman than Boone Pickens is getting into alternative energy.
“I have the same feelings about wind,” Mr. Pickens said in an interview, “as I had about the best oil field I ever found.” He is planning to build the biggest wind farm in the world, a $10 billion behemoth that could power a small city by itself. … Article…
Doug
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I guess I am in the wrong business. This guy will be getting $77,000 a month ($924,000 a year!) just for letting these windmills be put on his empty acreage! And these guys in Texas have so much land, no one even sees the things! Almost a $1M a year to do nothing!
I shoulda been a cowboy!
These things are bigger by far than the one's we have in SoCal. You can probably count them from space!! But like the guy says, they look better than oil wells. Too bad they kill birds, though.
My fear is that they will gain enough popularity to where every city will want some and we'll have to see them everywhere. Hope that never happens, but .....
I think these are a good idea. Anything to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.
How do they get up on the top to work on these things? Is there an elevator inside or stairs they have to climb? Maybe a helicopter lowers them?
If you have ever driven in the open areas of southern California, you have seen their "wind farms". They really don't look so bad. But I agree that I wouldn't want them "in my backyard".