LOCATION/TYPE

NEWS HOME

[ exact phrase in "" • results by date ]

[ Google-powered • results by relevance ]


Archive
RSS

Add NWW headlines to your site (click here)

Get weekly updates

WHAT TO DO
when your community is targeted

RSS

RSS feeds and more

Keep Wind Watch online and independent!

Donate via Paypal

Donate via Stripe

Selected Documents

All Documents

Research Links

Alerts

Press Releases

FAQs

Campaign Material

Photos & Graphics

Videos

Allied Groups

Wind Watch is a registered educational charity, founded in 2005.

News Watch Home

Could this be Oregon’s next big wind farm? 

Credit:  Pete Danko, Staff Reporter | Portland Business Journal | Dec 2, 2016 | www.bizjournals.com ~~

A big wind farm proposed for Eastern Oregon now has the permit it needs to go forward from the state’s Energy Facility Siting Council.

That doesn’t guarantee that the 399-megawatt Saddle Butte project, in both Morrow and Gilliam counties, will be built. Proposed projects, even permitted ones, regularly linger or even vanish, and a wind farm approaching Saddle Butte’s scale hasn’t been completed in Oregon in more than four years.

But this is a project that does appear to have some factors working in its favor.

First, Portland General Electric is hoping to put 500-plus megawatts of new renewables out to bid next year, and while the company has said it will consider all kinds of green sources, on cost, wind figures to be tough to beat. There are other approved wind projects, but Saddle Butte is now in the mix.

Alternatively, at least some of Saddle Butte’s power could be attractive to a corporate buyer.

Nike, after all, recently agreed to the direct purchase of wind power from three existing Columbia River Gorge wind farms owned by Avangrid Renewables. Avangrid also landed an unnamed corporate buyer for 56 megawatts of solar that it’s building in Crook County.

Another thing that could work in Saddle Butte’s favor is the incentives likely to be available to the project from the federal government.

Wind projects have a choice: They can take a production tax credit that pays 2.3 cents per kilowatt-hour of electricity generated during the first 10 years of operation – a big sum with wind energy going for 5 cents or less these days – or they can take an investment tax credit worth 30 percent of the cost of the project.

There’s a twist, though: The incentives are only available at those levels for projects that are under construction before the end of this year. Next year, the PTC falls to 80 percent of its value, and the ITC ratchets down to 24 percent of a project’s cost.

Source:  Pete Danko, Staff Reporter | Portland Business Journal | Dec 2, 2016 | www.bizjournals.com

This article is the work of the source indicated. Any opinions expressed in it are not necessarily those of National Wind Watch.

The copyright of this article resides with the author or publisher indicated. As part of its noncommercial educational effort to present the environmental, social, scientific, and economic issues of large-scale wind power development to a global audience seeking such information, National Wind Watch endeavors to observe “fair use” as provided for in section 107 of U.S. Copyright Law and similar “fair dealing” provisions of the copyright laws of other nations. Send requests to excerpt, general inquiries, and comments via e-mail.

Wind Watch relies entirely
on User Funding
   Donate via Paypal
(via Paypal)
Donate via Stripe
(via Stripe)

Share:

e-mail X FB LI TG TG Share


News Watch Home

Get the Facts
CONTACT DONATE PRIVACY ABOUT SEARCH
© National Wind Watch, Inc.
Use of copyrighted material adheres to Fair Use.
"Wind Watch" is a registered trademark.

 Follow:

Wind Watch on X Wind Watch on Facebook

Wind Watch on Linked In Wind Watch on Mastodon