Why Wind Energy?

The Good News:

As we all know there is currently a big push for going "green" in everything we do. Wind energy is one of the ways in which we can help to secure our future in energy production while decreasing our dependence on fuel which is not so "green."

With federal and state requirements being developed on the percentage of our energy that must come from renewables in the near future, it seems as if wind energy, among other renewable energy sources like solar and biofuel, is jumping to the forefront. Some groups are pushing to have 25% of our energy come from renewable sources by 2025. Visit the 25x'25 alliance's Web site. More specific to wind, many believe it is feasible to have 20% wind energy by the year 2030. Visit 20% Windpower by 2030 for more details.

What makes the wind industry even more exciting is that a lot of the progress being made is in Texas and our region specifically has excellent wind resources. The state of Texas leads the country in renewable energy potential. With wide open spaces and wind abundant resources, Texas has been called the Saudi Arabia of wind.
In 1999 Texas had approximately 180 MW of wind power capacity. After seeing massive expansion in wind energy development in 2008, Texas now has over 8,000 MW of installed capacity.

Specific to the area and landowners that Caprock serves, the wind in the Panhandle of Texas is rated as class 4 wind. This is better wind than what they have around Sweetwater and Abilene where in recent years wind energy development has seen tremendous growth. See below for the breakdown of wind ratings in Texas.

Source: The Energy Report 2008

Another positive is that our area has the potential to gain access to high voltage transmission lines. The Caprock Plains Region of Texas is positioned in close proximity to both the Southwest Power Pool (SPP) and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), two different electric grids located in Texas.

It seems as if the overall view of wind energy development in Texas is a fairly positive one. Many people would love to see wind farms put up on their property. Wind energy development could very well provide assistant to struggling farmers and ranchers in the area.

Current Challenges:

There are several issues that must be worked through in order to get wind energy development to our landowners. The first has to deal with the current credit crisis and the state of our economy. While the last couple of years seemed to be a time of increased investment in wind energy, in the last several months we have seen a slowdown in investments as well as a slowdown in development. CPWEA is hopeful that the recently approved stimulus package will help to reverse this trend. See the American Wind Energy Association’s (AWEA) comments on the stimulus package, click here.

The next big issue then is transmission. Without transmission a wind farm does our area no good. We must have some way of getting the energy generated to the places that need it. Some relief may come from the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) who has recently allocated approximately $5 billion to utility companies to start construction of transmission lines throughout the state of Texas in the near future (click here to read related article.) Transmission will still be an issue for a lot of the panhandle of Texas who may not be directly affected by these lines (click to see transmission line scenario 2 adopted by the PUCT). Another potential solution to the transmission problem may come in the form of Federal regulation (click to read more on the issue).

These challenges represent some of the things that Caprock is dedicated to helping its members with. Together we can overcome the challenges facing wind energy today and take advantage of the potential our area has for wind energy development. Caprock’s overarching goal is to get our landowners’ land developed and collecting royalties from the development.