Wind Turbines

It's not a regulatory arm of the government, but try to find a gadget in your home that Underwriters Laboratories hasn't touched. Check under the computer mouse or the smoke alarm, beneath the light switch or on the TV cable, and the telltale "UL" stamp will be there. The marking means the device is unlikely to catch fire. And if you accidentally drive away from the gas station with the nozzle still in the tank, UL is the reason you don't haul away the entire pump and set the neighborhood ablaze.

In an effort to tap one of the high desert's most abundant resources, Palmdale is allowing large shopping centers and business parks to install small wind turbines in their parking lots to save on electricity costs. Civic leaders in the Antelope Valley have taken a variety of steps in recent years to harness and adapt to the region's vast supplies of sun and wind. In Lancaster, hundreds of acres of desert landscape will be used for a huge bed of solar-thermal panels. Both Palmdale and Lancaster have taken steps to ban new lawns to help conserve water.

Wind energy now supplies about 5% of California's total electricity needs, or enough to power more than 400,000 households. That's the word from the California Wind Energy Assn., which said that California put up more new turbines than any state last year, with 921.3 megawatts installed. Most of that activity occurred in the Tehachapi area of Kern County, with some big projects in Solano, Contra Costa and Riverside counties as well. “The total amount of wind energy installations in 2011 created a banner year for wind generation in California and is helping to drive California closer to reaching its goal of 33% renewable energy ,” said Nancy Rader, executive director of the California Wind Energy Assn.  Wind capacity in the Golden State has doubled since 2002.

WASHINGTON — President Obama, in a rare move, blocked the acquisition by a Chinese-owned company of four wind farm projects next to a military base in Oregon. Obama cited in a presidential order issued Friday "credible evidence" that the company "might take action that threatens to impair the national security of the United States. " The decision comes against the backdrop of a presidential race in which Obama and Republican opponent Mitt Romney have traded jabs over who would be more effective in answering the challenges the ascendant Chinese economy poses.

This winter, New Year's Eve revelers will have a close-up view of Times Square's first environmentally friendly billboard powered entirely by wind and sun. Construction on the 35,000-pound sign that will advertise Ricoh Americas Corp. is to begin this month across from the building where the ball drops on New Year's Eve. Powered by 16 wind turbines and 64 solar panels, the sign is expected to save $12,000 to $15,000 per month in electricity costs. A lighting ceremony for the 126-foot wide, 47-foot tall sign is scheduled for Dec. 4.

For at least 40 years I have passed the Gorman muffin-shaped hills that Barnbaum wrote about. Each spring I, too, have marveled at the color which seemingly couldn't have been trapped for a year beneath the surface of the earth. I feel Barnbaum's column was too soft--environmentalists, for the most part, are that way. We must not question our anger about the wind turbines. If you don't believe me, just take a drive over the Tehachepi pass to the east and then tell me you love the view.

Ikea Group, the world's biggest furniture retailer, will double its investment in renewable energy to $4 billion by 2020 as part of a drive to reduce costs as cash-strapped consumers become more price sensitive. The additional spending on projects such as wind farms and solar parks will be needed to keep expenses down as the company maintains its pace of expansion, Chief Executive Mikael Ohlsson said in an interview in Malmo, Sweden. "I foresee we'll continue to increase our investments in renewable energy," said Ohlsson, who plans to step down this year after 3 1/2 years at the helm.

James Flanigan's column, "Clean Air Act Will Fuel New Technologies" (Oct. 31), about the benefits of the federal clean air legislation is off base on at least one point. Commercial generation of electricity by wind and solar power will not have to wait until the next decade as Flanigan predicts. It has been growing steadily in California during the past decade. In 1989, wind energy produced 1% of the state's (the world's eighth-largest economy) total energy demand for that year, enough to power a city the size of San Francisco.

Leslie Latterman says her war against backyard wind turbines began the day she had to scream to be heard over a neighbor's towering new windmill. "It sounds like having a B-17 on the runway warming up for takeoff," said Latterman, who lives in San Bernardino County's high desert community of Oak Hills. Latterman and a group of neighbors crusading against residential turbines won a partial victory Tuesday when county supervisors adopted stricter regulations for the beacons of alternative energy.