Courtesy of the great state of Texas. From the Washington Post:
Texas, headquarters of America’s oil industry, is about to stake a fortune on wind power.
In what experts say is the biggest investment in the clean and renewable energy in U.S. history, utility officials in the Lone Star State gave preliminary approval Thursday to a $4.9 billion plan to build new transmission lines to carry wind-generated electricity from gusty West Texas to urban areas like Dallas.
Later in the story, the Pickens Plan makes an appearance:
The wind energy industry has benefited from the support of billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens, who is planning to build the world’s largest wind farm on about 200,000 acres in the Texas Panhandle. When completed, Pickens’ 2,700 turbines will be capable of producing enough electricity to power 1.3 million homes.
Pickens has become an evangelist for wind power as a way to break the nation’s dependence on foreign oil, launching an advertising blitz in which he warned: “I’ve been an oilman all my life, but this is one emergency we can’t drill our way out of.”
“It’s a good decision,” Pickens spokesman Jay Rosser said of Thursday’s PUC vote. “It recognizes the important role wind in Texas will play in meeting the state’s growing energy and energy stability needs.”
Full story here.