{"id":33445,"date":"2013-12-31T11:26:18","date_gmt":"2013-12-31T17:26:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=33445"},"modified":"2013-12-31T11:26:18","modified_gmt":"2013-12-31T17:26:18","slug":"new-year-brings-good-and-bad-news-for-texas-wind-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2013\/12\/31\/new-year-brings-good-and-bad-news-for-texas-wind-power\/","title":{"rendered":"New Year Brings Good and Bad News For Texas Wind Power"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"module image aligncenter mceTemp mceIEcenter\" id=\"attachment_22090\" style=\"width: 620px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"Wind turbines in West Texas help produce record amounts of electricity for the state.\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/Windmill-val.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-large wp-image-22090\" alt=\"Wind turbines in West Texas help produce record amounts of electricity for the state.\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/Windmill-val-620x233.jpg\" width=\"620\" height=\"233\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/Windmill-val-620x233.jpg 620w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/Windmill-val-300x113.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/Windmill-val.jpg 639w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 620px) 100vw, 620px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mose Buchele\/StateImpactWind turbines in West Texas help produce record amounts of electricity for the state.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>By New Year&#8217;s Day, the network of transmission lines that comprise Texas&#8217; &#8220;Competitive Renewable Energy Zone&#8221; [CREZ] will be fully operational, bringing electricity from wind turbines in West Texas and the Panhandle to points east. Many of the lines are already active (and have contributed to record-breaking percentages of Texas electricity coming from wind), but the Jan. 1 deadline is cause for celebration among those who have long prided Texas&#8217; role as a leader in wind power.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI like to compare it to something like the highway for electricity,\u201d Russell Smith, Executive Director of the Texas Renewable Energy Industries Association, told StateImpact Texas.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><div class=\"related-content alignleft\"><h4 class=\"related-header\">Related<\/h4><div class=\"links\"><h5>Posts<\/h5><ul><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/11\/27\/as-tax-credit-hangs-in-the-balance-texas-sets-another-wind-record\/\">As Tax Credit Hangs in the Balance, Texas Sets Another Wind Record<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2013\/07\/05\/how-texas-won-the-race-to-harness-the-wind\/\">How Texas Won the Race to Harness the Wind<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/10\/09\/how-winds-success-in-texas-could-pave-the-way-for-more-solar\/\">How Wind&#8217;s Success in Texas Could Pave the Way For More Solar<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div><div class=\"topics\"><h5>Topics<\/h5><p class=\"topic\"><img class=\"alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/08\/Wind-Transmission-Lines-60x60.jpg\" height=\"60\" width=\"60\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/topic\/wind-energy-transmission\/\">What Is Wind Energy Transmission Texas?<\/a><\/p><\/div><\/div>Just like it took a network of roads to usher in the age of the automobile, Smith hopes the CREZ transmission system will encourage further investment in renewables. He envisions a West Texas &#8220;where you have solar available in the daytime and on-peak, and wind in the evening and at night. Plus some natural gas backup and probably some large scale storage out there.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It\u2019s going to be a very robust system,\u201d Smith added.<\/p>\n<p>But just as this infrastructure to carry wind power is completed, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.komonews.com\/news\/business\/Federal-tax-credit-for-renewable-energy-to-expire--237838221.html\" data-mce-=\"\">the expiration of federal tax credits <\/a>for wind projects could hinder investment.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It will have an impact,&#8221; Smith says.<\/p>\n<p>Though Smith still thinks lawmakers will renew wind-friendly policies in 2014.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I\u2019ve got to believe that\u2019s true. Otherwise, I guess I would be ready to give this up,&#8221; he says. &#8220;But I do believe that our leaders will figure this out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>If renewable energy sources aren&#8217;t filling up real estate on the new transmission lines, traditional fossil fuels may.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf all the capacity is not needed for renewable power then fossil fuel generated power could be delivered. Such as natural gas,&#8221; Terry Hadley, a spokesperson for the Texas Public Utility Commission tells StateImpact Texas.<\/p>\n<p>The lines are paid for by a fee tacked on to energy bills. Hadley says Texans in the parts of the state managed by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas will end up paying about seven dollars more a month for at least the next several years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mose Buchele\/StateImpactWind turbines in West Texas help produce record amounts of electricity for the state. By New Year&#8217;s Day, the network of transmission lines that comprise Texas&#8217; &#8220;Competitive Renewable Energy Zone&#8221; [CREZ] will be fully operational, bringing electricity from wind turbines in West Texas and the Panhandle to points east. Many of the lines are [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[60],"tags":[63,24],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33445"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33445"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33445\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33467,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33445\/revisions\/33467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}