Los Angeles Wind Farm One Step Closer to Reality
by Michael Graham Richard, Gatineau, Canada on 02. 8.08
The city of Los Angeles, the second largest in the U.S., has pledged to get one fifth of its energy from renewable sources by 2010. A step towards in that direction is the construction of a wind farm in the Tehachapi Mountains about 100 miles north of the city. The $425 million, 120 megawatt facility will have 80 turbines and a new high-voltage transmission line, and will help double the portion of electricity from wind that the city gets. It was supposed to come online in 2004, but various delays and problems kept it from being built until now. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa also announced plans for another wind farm on an adjacent site. Together, the projects would generate enough electricity for nearly 130,000 homes. ::SFGate, ::LA DailyNews, ::Enercon E-126: The World’s Largest Wind Turbine (for now)
Awesome.
I bet some part of the delay was considerations about earthquakes. Nothing we would have to care about in northern europe, but LA is a different matter.
Earthquakes. As a Californian I think I can safely say we know how to design around earthquakes. And there are thousands of power generating wind mills at work in California already. I'd be more willing to bet on politics and more specifically getting people behind spending the money.
you forgot to mention that the new "high-voltage transmission line" is planned to go right through Angeles National Forest...including some potential wilderness areas....
not sure I'm a fan of that....