On 9 Jan 2009 09:29:02 -0600, Dave wrote:

Come on, Marty. I know you're more rational than to post such a
non-sequitur. Do you believe those wind farms offer enough profit so as not
to require the taxpayers to shovel tax money at them?

They seem to cost about 2cents/kwhr more than conventional coal
plants. In Iowa they provide 5% of the juice . It cost about a buck a
watt to install it, two mill per tower. If the wind blew all the time
a typical windmill would produce energy at the same rate as a 30
bbl/day oil well. You would need more than twice that much crude to
generate that much juice, of course. Another freeby is the methane
from a landfill. Des Moines gets 6.4 megawatt from eight Caterpillar
engines. That' 1070 hp electrical each.. The shaft work from the
engines would be greater.

Casady