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Lower Pricing Makes Wind Increasingly Cost-Competitive with Natural Gas by Staff Clean Edge News, January 25, 2011

US Wind Installations Down in 2010

America's wind industry built 5,115 megawatts of wind power last year, barely half of 2009's record pace, but entered 2011 with over 5,600 megawatts currently under construction - and with wind cost- competitive with natural gas for new electric generation, utilities are moving to lock in favorable rates.

The American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) recently reported that 3,195 megawatts (MW) of wind-powered electric generating capacity came online in the fourth quarter of 2010. That performance was below the 4,113 MW installed in the same period in 2009, but a leap from the third quarter of 2010, when only 670 MW were installed. The U.S. finished the year with a total of 5,115 MW of new wind power.

Buoyed by a one-year extension of the 1603 Investment Tax Credit for renewable energy in the final days of the 111th Congress, the industry entered the new year with over 5,600 MW of electric power currently under construction, well above the same time a year earlier. Further projects are expected to start up in time to meet the new construction deadline for the tax credit, now set to expire at the end of 2011. The industry is likely to finish 2011 ahead of 2010 numbers, according to Elizabeth Salerno, AWEA Director of Industry Data & Analysis.

"Wind's costs have dropped over the past two years, with power purchase agreements being signed in the range of 5 to 6 cents per kilowatt-hour recently." Salerno said. "With uncertainty around natural gas and power prices as the economy recovers, wind's long- term price stability is even more valued. We expect that utilities will move to lock in more wind contracts, given the cost-competitive nature of wind in today's market."

U.S. wind capacity now stands at 40,180 MW, an increase in capacity of 15% over the start of 2010, AWEA reported. For the first time, U.S. capacity fell second to China's; China now has 41,800 MW in operation, an increase of 62% in capacity over a year ago, according to a Jan. 13 report from the Chinese Renewable Energy Industries Association.

With uncertainty over national policies still holding back the U.S. industry, state targets for renewable energy continue to drive wind installations in many areas of the country. "We'll continue to work for a strong federal energy policy that drives the deployment of renewable energy technologies in the 112th Congress," Bode said, "but we'll also be defending and improving on state renewable targets, as well as promoting other sources of demand - such as more distributed and community wind projects, and corporate purchasing under the new WindMade trustmark."

The top five states for cumulative wind energy capacity at the close of 2010 all have such state targets:

• Texas: 10,085 MW
• Iowa: 3,675
• California: 3,177
• Minnesota: 2,192
• Washington: 2,105

Other states active in pursuing targets for renewable energy last year were Illinois (498 MW added), California (455 MW), South Dakota (396), and Minnesota (396 MW). Five more states, which generally began tapping their inexhaustible wind resources more recently than the leaders, showed growth rates above 100%. The list starts with Delaware and Maryland, which added their first utility-scale wind turbines in 2010:

• Delaware & Maryland: First utility-scale installation
• Idaho: +140%
• South Dakota: +126%
• Arizona: +103%