Wisconsin Developers Study Expansion of Wind Power by 378% Through 2012

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Wind power developers in Wisconsin are studying the possibility of adding 1,536 megawatts (MW) of generation capacity. Wisconsin currently has eight windfarms that can produce up a total of 392 MW to the grid. The existing operational windfarms range in size from 9 MW to 99 MW. Utilities own 233 MW of operational wind generation capacity, and private energy producers own 159 MW. The current operational units came online between 1999 and 2008.

The majority of the proposed capacity, 1,196 MW, is being planned by private energy producers, and about 287 MW is being planned by utilities. The new windfarms are expected to come online between 2009 and 2012. The cost to build a windfarm currently runs between $2 million and $3 million per megawatt, so the cost of the new wind power projects will be between $3 billion and $4.5 billion.

Windfarm developers include:

• Acciona Wind Energy USA (Chicago, Illinois), a subsidiary of Acciona Energia (MCE:ANA) (Madrid, Spain)
• Babcock & Brown LP (San Francisco, California), a subsidiary of Babcock & Brown Limited (ASX:BNB) (Sydney, Australia)
• Emerging Energies LLP (Hubertus, Wisconsin)
• Horizon Wind LLC (Houston Texas), a subsidiary of Energies de Portugal SA (OTC:EDPFY) (Lisbon, Portugal)
• Invenergy LLC (Chicago)
• Navitas Energy Incorporated (Minneapolis, Minnesota), primarily owned by Gamesa Energia (MCE:GAM) (Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain)
• Midwest Wind Energy LLC (Chicago)
• Prelude LLC (Suamico, Wisconsin)
• We Energies (Milwaukee, Wisconsin), a subsidiary of Wisconsin Energy Corporation (NYSE:WEC) (Milwaukee)

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