Lubbock, Texas - Billionaire T. Boone Pickens is planning to cash in on the wind energy boom by building the world's largest wind farm in West Texas.

    The oil tycoon wants to install large wind turbines in parts of four Panhandle counties in a project that would produce up to 4,000 megawatts of electricity.

    If Pickens' company, Mesa Power LP, does build the wind farm it would be the largest in the world, American Wind Energy Association spokeswoman Susan Williams Sloan said. It would generate more than five times the 735 megawatts produced at the present largest wind farm near Abilene.

Sometimes when I hear people talking about how renewables can "never" meet realistic needs (usually w/o reviewing consumption or attempting any realistic definition of "realistic"), I hear the echo of confident pronouncements of the past...

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers ."
-Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943
"640K ought to be enough for anybody."
-Bill Gates, 1981
"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us,"
-Western Union internal memo, 1876
"I don't know what use any one could find for a machine that would make copies of documents. It certainly couldn't be a feasible business by itself."
-the head of IBM, refusing to back the idea, forcing the inventor to found Xerox.
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
-Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977
footnote

this is the closest I get to cheerful, so do try to appreciate it while it lasts... :-)

The difference between theory and practise in practise ...