Wind power plan for lake gains speed

You might have Ohio's worst Congress Critter representing you, but mine, Marcy Kaptur, is one of the best. Just look what she's doing for us.

toledoblade.com --
Wind power plan for lake gains speed;
efforts totaling over $1M seek to win new industry:



Last time I saw Congresswoman Kaptur, she was introducing John Edwards at the Seagate Tower in Toledo. Definitely two people on the same page.

By TOM HENRY
BLADE STAFF WRITER

More than $1 million could be spent in the coming months pursuing offshore wind power in Lake Erie, even though the region just lost out on a bid to have East Toledo host the nation’s first testing laboratory for offshore wind turbine blades.

A $250,000 wildlife study, funded by a grant the Toledo-Lucas County Port Authority obtained from U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D., Toledo), recently began along the western Lake Erie shoreline.

The goal of that study is to get the region’s clean energy and wildlife proponents on the same page over the risks posed to birds and bats.

The next phase would involve putting two or three wind turbines along the western Lake Erie shoreline as early as the summer of 2008 to see just how lethal the devices might be.

Sites have not been selected, but they likely would be between Toledo and Lorain, Ohio.

The turbines themselves would cost several more million dollars, said Steve Watts, wind programs manager for Green Energy Ohio, a nonprofit group coordinating the study.

Called the Northwest Ohio Coastal Wind Initiative, the study looms big for a region looking toward renewable energy for jobs.

Marcie: headed into the wind! We sit in the path of migratory birds (who have more sense than us and go on vacation when the snow flies up here).

The study Representative Kaptur is funding will coordinate our renewable energy folks with the wildlife conservationists who would prefer our wind turbines don't create diced squab.

One word: Outstanding!

Miss Kaptur, who was in Washington, said during a telephone interview that northwest Ohio’s wildlife issue will be researched adequately by the port authority study.

The region is “absolutely headed into the wind,” she said.

“We have a massive industry to give birth to here,” she said. “God gave us the resource. We just have to capture it.”

The Toledo Zoo is one of several new sites under negotiation for installation of tower gauges to help measure the region’s wind velocity, Mr. Watts said.

The upcoming research is in addition to a $1 million grant Miss Kaptur secured last year for the wind-wildlife issue to be studied at Bowling Green State University’s Firelands campus in Huron, Ohio, via the construction of one or two wind turbines.

For some true inside baseball stuff, read Today's OpEd by Marci Kaptur herself.

She's right in the middle of the Walter Reed investigation and when the Republicans chide us about the "pork" in the defense bill, note what kind of pork Kaptur included:

Just in this defense bill, I was successful in arguing for over $800 million dollars in support of serious brain injury, PTSD, and neuro-psychiatric care for our returning veterans.

This state could really use some more Kapturs and less Jean Schmits and John Boehners. Don't you agree?