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ALBERT H. BOWERS III
NAVAL ARCHITECT & MARITIME CONSULTANT
bertna@twcny.rr.com


January 31, 2009

President Barack H. Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500


Renewable Energy Concerns

Dear President Obama:

Congratulations on your recent inauguration. I am pleased that change has
come to America. My concern is with your expressed support for alternative energy investments, particularly as part of the economic stimulus package currently under consideration by the Senate. I am concerned because, here in Northern New York, alternative energy has principally been installations of large industrial wind turbines. In our part of New York we have one of the nations scenic treasures, the Thousand Islands area, which is rapidly being ruined by uncontrolled and over-incentivized industrial wind development.

I am involved in our local planning board and we find ourselves, and our citizens, being pursued aggressively by large corporate wind developers. I am also a naval architect and marine engineer with a Harvard MBA and 50 years of experience in designing and constructing large industrial machinery in ships and offshore structures.

My own research as to the efficacy of wind energy supplied by industrial wind turbines has not convinced me that these devices contribute significantly to either our energy independence or to a reduction in greenhouse gases. The principal beneficiaries are the wind developers and wealthy investors who reap significant income and tax relief from their ownership of these devices at the expense of taxpayers and electrical
ratepayers.

By my calculation approximately two-thirds of the developer’s income is from
federal tax breaks, including accelerated depreciation and the production tax credit recently extended by Congress. Wind developers have, through their lobbying, secured additional benefits from state and local governments, principally in the form of tax breaks and the renewable portfolio standards enacted by a number of states. Also, I believe the developers are able to claim carbon credits from their wind turbine installations that may
be used to offset pollution elsewhere. Direct income to the developers comes from the sale of the electricity produced and sold to utilities at prices higher than electricity from other sources.

I don’t believe it is appropriate to subsidize industries unless, through accelerated technological advancement, they may become economically self-supporting. This will not happen with wind turbines as their design is at a mature stage. The only way to marginally improve their efficiency is to make them ever larger. Thus, if we construct wind turbines they will forever be heavily subsidized and will result in a considerably higher cost of electricity for all consumers.

The basic problem with wind energy is the highly variable and intermittent nature of the wind itself. Because of this intermittent and variable characteristic, wind turbines can never replace conventional power plants fueled by other types of energy.

Before committing to any program to expand wind energy, its alleged benefits and environmental effects need to be thoroughly researched, defined, examined, and vetted by independent experts from our universities and not by the wind developers and their paid consultants. We must verify that the addition of wind turbines to our electrical grid will actually result in meaningful reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. We must also know the unit costs of such carbon reductions. Unless wind turbines are shown to
be an economical means to reduce carbon emissions, there is no reason to have more of them.

Additional points relative to your stimulus package are that, except during
construction, wind turbine facilities provide little employment opportunity. Furthermore, the principal components of the turbines are mostly imported, and therefore the manufacture of wind turbines does not provide significant employment in the US.

You have stated that our actions as a nation will be governed by science. I
applaud your insistence on this principle and would like confirmation that the currently popular wind turbine developments advocated by the very powerful wind lobby will be subjected to knowledgeable and independent scrutiny of their scientific, economic, and ethical basis.

Sincerely,

Albert H. Bowers III

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