Wind Industry Gathers in Chicago – This is No Cottage Business

ByRod Adams

The American Wind Energy Association held its annual meeting last week in Chicago. It was a massive affair full of optimism and high powered government and industry leaders laying out their plans for the future. There was also an impressive display of wares in the exhibition hall.

Here are some statistics – 1,200 exhibitors, 23,000 attendees, 290,400 square feet of exhibition floor space. Speeches by Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, Energy Secretary Steven Chu (via a taped speech) and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Jon Wellinghoff. Attendance by seven governors, including Chet Culver of Iowa, Jim Doyle of Wisconsin, Jennifer Granholm of Michigan, Pat Quinn of Illinois, Ted Strickland of Ohio, Mark Parkinson of Kansas and Edward Rendell of Pennsylvania. You can watch some video of the event at http://www.awea.org/windpower2009/webisodes/

Next week, I hope to sneak in a few minutes at the Nuclear Energy Assembly that will be held here in Washington, DC. It will be interesting to compare the two, especially in light of the characterization by anti-nuclear activists that nuclear power represents corporate and government power while wind power is more community oriented and locally controlled.

Avatar
Rod Adams

Rod Adams is Managing Partner of Nucleation Capital, a venture fund that invests in advanced nuclear, which provides affordable access to this clean energy sector to pronuclear and impact investors. Rod, a former submarine Engineer Officer and founder of Adams Atomic Engines, Inc., which was one of the earliest advanced nuclear ventures, is an atomic energy expert with small nuclear plant operating and design experience. He has engaged in technical, strategic, political, historic and financial analysis of the nuclear industry, its technology, regulation, and policies for several decades through Atomic Insights, both as its primary blogger and as host of The Atomic Show Podcast. Please click here to subscribe to the Atomic Show RSS feed. To join Rod's pronuclear network and receive his occasional newsletter, click here.

Similar Posts

Discussing Zion Versus Wind Turbines for Illinois

ByRod Adams

Nancy Thorner of Lake Bluff has written a letter to the editor of the Daily Herald to tell them she would rather have a restarted Zion Nuclear Plant in her backyard than accept several proposed wind turbines that would produce just a tiny fraction of the power – if the wind blows from the right…

Steven Chu Confirmation Hearings on The Atomic Show

ByRod Adams

I published the promised episode of The Atomic Show with clips from Steven Chu’s confirmation hearing with the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee this morning. After spending several hours listening and digesting the sworn testimony of the proposed leader for the DOE, my conclusion is that there is still a lot of work left…

Headline writers at it again

ByRod Adams

People that write headlines continue to give journalism a bad name. Of course, their jobs are different – journalists really do feel a professional obligation to provide balanced stories that attempt to inform their readers; headline writers want to attract people to a story so that they will read it. One profession needs space to…

Must Bookmark Reference Post – Why You Cannot Build a Bomb Using Spent Nuclear Fuel

ByRod Adams

Steve Packard at Depleted Cranium has published an excellent, well-researched post titled Why You Can’t Build a Bomb From Spent Fuel. It is getting high praise among people who understand the technical and political aspects of the topic being covered. Here are some sample reactions: “In the context of this discussion, this is very useful….