Wind farms sprout in western New York

[jpak]

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080504/BUSINESS/805040307/1001

Wyoming County has 43,000 people, 46,000 dairy cows and a lot of wind.

Planted among the wide fields in the southern part of the county are numerous towering wind turbines — giant white windmills which at their highest stand about as tall as Kodak Tower. The whooshing whine of the long blades, sounding vaguely like a far-off jetliner, is occasionally drowned out by a passing pickup truck.

Noble Environmental Power, a Connecticut-based wind energy company, last year put up 67 turbines in the town of Eagle, about 60 miles southwest of Rochester. The turbines — standing 265 feet tall, with blades extending an additional 123 feet — turn out 100 megawatts of electricity that is fed into the national power grid and then sold to businesses and homes.

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Aside from Wyoming County, there are 62 other wind energy projects proposed across the state, according to the New York Independent System Operator. They include plans by Massachusetts-based First Wind for two projects in Ontario County and one in Genesee County; a 120-megawatt wind farm in Orleans County by Airtricity Inc. of Ireland; and a 75-megawatt wind farm in Genesee County by Tonawanda Creek Wind LLC.

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[mac2]

1. They make wind turbines and towers in the old steel

plant in Buffalo, New York. They are doing pretty well too.