From Floating wind turbine may be in sea by 2009:

The world’s first floating wind turbine could be generating electricity in the North Sea in 2009 under a research pact between Norwegian energy group Norsk Hydro and German engineering firm Siemens.

Floating wind turbines would represent a technological breakthrough for offshore power generation, which has had to rely on shallow sites for turbines installed on the seabed.

…

If tests of the 5 megawatt wind turbine were successful, a small offshore wind park could be built around 2013-14. Siemens said it would spend several million euros on the research project, on which Hydro has already spent 30 million crowns.

It’s easy to think of wind power as a simple, mature technology, when in fact we’re still seeing a lot of improvements in ways to turn moving air into moving electrons. Floating turbines, new designs for more efficient blades or better vertical-axis turbines, better ways to merge wind power into existing grids, etc.

This is all driven by economics, of course. For a long time it only made sense to use wind power in a very crude, brute force way–turbines placed where the strongest, most reliable wind blew over accessible land near large power consuming areas that could easily incorporate the intermittent power into the local grid. But with rising electricity generation costs and the growing awareness that we have to make the market reflect the negative externalities of fossil fuels (by making them more expensive or by making wind cheaper through subsidies), we’re taking a much finer-grained view of wind, and developing technology to exploit its less convenient forms and incarnations.

It’s about freakin’ time.

From Gov. Rendell Dedicates Locust Ridge Wind Farm in PA:

[Pennsylvania] Governor Edward G. Rendell set in motion the wind turbines of Pennsylvania’s newest wind farm June 19, saying the state’s strategic investments in and commitment to renewable energy technologies are helping the commonwealth. Locust Ridge will produce 68,328 megawatt-hours annually.

…

The wind farm, owned by Iberdrola, was developed by its affiliate, Community Energy Inc., which has more than 2,000 MW of wind power capacity at projects already operating or are in development. Gamesa constructed the 13 turbines at the Locust Ridge Wind Farm. Both companies are international clean energy leaders that chose to establish operations in Pennsylvania as a result of the Rendell administration’s energy policies and strategic investments.

Pennsylvania is already a leader in wind energy production on the East Coast with 179 megawatts (MW) of capacity, including Locust Ridge. Within the next 12 months, the commonwealth expects new wind farm projects will add another 214 MW of capacity and more than double the state’s current capacity.

First, Pennsylvania is one of the best places imaginable for wind power in the eastern US. It has an incredible amount of virgin forest plus many mountain ridges that provide excellent access to good wind conditions. (I live in Wilkes-Barre, PA for about seven years, and while the line that the Keystone State is “Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and not much in the middle” isn’t true, it’s close enough to get long time ride runners upset.)

Second, I don’t know how they figure that PA “is already a leader in wind energy production on the East Coast with 179 megawatts (MW) of capacity”. New York, at 370 MW is where? The southwest?

From A strategic perspective on 21st century energy challenges:

Energy will be one of the two or three defining issues we’ll face over the next decade. Since post-1999, we’ve essentially been in a crisis mode. That’s the result of an accumulation of factors.

Recommended.

From Greenland ice may melt much faster: U.N. scientist:

New research shows that man-made climate change could cause the Greenland ice sheet to break up in hundreds, rather than thousands, of years, the chair of a United Nations panel of scientists said on Monday.

Its entire collapse would raise sea-levels globally by around 7 meters (23 feet), they said.

…

The new research shows rapid melting on the surface of the Greenland ice sheet. Meltwater is disappearing down huge crevasses, and theory suggests that water will lubricate the bottom of the ice sheet and speed up its flow into the sea.

…

Metz underlined the scale of the problem in trying to establish control over greenhouse gas emissions within 10 years, the most ambitious target his report considered.

“It’s a huge challenge to turn around the supertanker of global emissions within 10 years. Many would say it’s impossible,” he told the conference. “I’m not saying that yet.”

I’m convinced that this is part of an ongoing pattern we’ll be living with for years–new discoveries and confirmations of suspicions showing how much more rapidly the climate can change and is changing in response to CO2 emissions.