Wind supporters line up

The wind-power industry's biggest players have blown into L.A.'s downtown convention center, and their mission is not just to celebrate their soaring fortunes amid a nationwide green-energy boom.

The wind-energy business in 2006 booked its second year of record growth, and executives are pushing the industry faithful to think bigger. Much bigger. By 2030, they want wind farms to supply 20% of the nation's energy -- a huge leap from today's contribution of less than 1%.

"It's not a forecast, but it is a plausible scenario," Randall Swisher, executive director of the American Wind Energy Assn., told attendees at the opening session of the group's Windpower 2007 conference.

Getting there won't be easy, he cautioned. "It requires a transformation of the electric industry and a whole number of things that we don't have today."

The most crucial of those needs: an extension of the federal production tax credit that has helped make the United States the fastest-growing wind power market. The on-again, off-again credit is set to expire at the end of next year.

Other obstacles include the rising costs of wind turbines and other equipment and a shortage of electrical transmission lines to carry wind energy to the power grid. Then there's public concern about noise, the danger to wildlife and visual intrusion caused by the rows of giant, white wind turbines that typify wind farms.

In addition, a wide-ranging energy bill backed by Rep. Nick Rahall (D-W.Va.) requires the federal Fish and Wildlife Service to create standards for siting, building and monitoring wind projects to prevent unnecessary harm to birds and bats that can fly into the spinning blades.

Wind energy's popularity has soared anyway, and the enthusiasm for it is only slightly damped by its inability to produce power full time. Governments around the world are counting on wind energy to help cut carbon emissions, which play a major role in global warming, while still keeping the lights on in a growing economy.

"We basically have between now and 2020 to get emissions globally to peak and to start to decline or we run a serious risk of climate systems spinning out of control," said Steve Sawyer, secretary general of the Global Wind Energy Council, based in Belgium. "The next 15 years are critical, and wind is in the best position."