Contrasts

Our free market, as long as it is clean coal or uranium, government consistently refused to raise the MRET, urged by large energy corporations, which caused amongst other things this:

Vestas has blamed uncertainty over wind power in Australia for its decision to close its Wynyard turbine assembly plant in northern Tasmania.

The Danish-owned company will leave the state at the end of the year but hopes a majority of its work force will stay in the wind power industry.

The Wynyard factory is designed to make two megawatt turbines but Vestas says the market is changing towards larger ones.

Senior vice-president Johnny Hoy Henriksen says the company has failed to sell a single turbine in 2006, and there are no orders for next year.

He says it is too costly to upgrade the factory for larger turbines.

Mr Henriksen says the Federal Government's decision not to raise renewable energy targets has left the future of wind power in Australia uncertain.

The closure will almost certainly result in the shutdown of a component manufacturer in Burnie.

Oztec Composites, run by Rob and Jackie Gee, employs 25 people manufacturing the housing for rotor blades.

"Rob and I have put a lot of years in getting the facility up and running to manufacture for Vestas," Ms Gee said.

"On a personal front, it's quite cutting - I just can't even put words to it."

Now the contrast with the some states in the USA.

It now looks likely that Vestas, the world’s largest wind turbine manufacturer will build a blade manufacturing plant in Nortern Colorado, near Windsor.  I’d guess that some of the factors that made Danish Vestas consider locating here are:

1. The proximity to NREL’s Wind Technology Center for turbine testing.
2. Amendment 37, which will require large investments in wind farms in Colorado.
3. The State’s central location, making it easy to ship blades anywhere in North America.
4. Political support for wind, especially from newly elected Bill Ritter and the Democratically controlled state legislature.
5. Colorado’s excellent wind resource.

The 500 high-paying jobs will be ones wind advocates can point to when talking about the benefits of renewable resources over fossil fuels.

It seems that a few incentives go a long way and provide 500 people with jobs.  Note the importance of political support that is so sadly lacking in Australia.  This government instead is colluding with big mining companies as detailed in this article:

The Federal Resources Minister, Ian Macfarlane, has called on state governments to remove restrictions on the shipment of uranium from their ports.

Mining heavyweights met government officials in Canberra today to discuss the transport and regulatory problems facing the industry.

They have named inconsistent regulation by the states and territories and uranium transport bans as obstacles to growth.

So it is very obvious who the snakes in this government talk to - mining heavyweights.  What hope has renewable power in this atmosphere.  I will be doing everything I can to make sure the present ban on uranium mining is kept in Western Australia including, if necessary, lying in front of the trucks and protesting.

Hat Tip to Peak Energy for this story.