THOMAS, W.Va. -- The windswept mountains of the pine-covered Allegheny Front hold a remote scenic attraction, with a carpet of campgrounds, parks, ski resorts and the Monongahela National Forest.
The rugged ridges and valleys are also pocked with old strip mines, a reminder of the prominent role that King Coal has played in the development of the aptly named Mountain State.
Along the ridgeline of Backbone Mountain, however, the ground is being broken to tap a new source of energy, as workers erect a series of gray tubular towers mounted with 115-foot-long white blades.
When fully assembled by year's end, this Mountaineer Wind Energy Center of 44 turbines will be the largest wind farm in the East.
FPL Energy's 66-megawatt power system -- enough to supply electricity to nearly 50,000 homes -- is the first of such projects that could turn this Appalachian region into what one advocate enthusiastically calls "the Saudi Arabia for wind power."
That hyperbole is based on serious prospects: a Dutch firm applied in August for a state permit to build 200 windmills in this northeast corner of West Virginia that embraces Maryland's western panhandle.
A 250-megawatt wind farm around Mount Storm recently got state Public Service Commission approval. And Dominion Resources is also weighing a wind energy project to be located next to its coal-fired generating plant at Mount Storm.
"Wind is an important component of our nation's move toward energy independence as we harness our natural resources for production of electricity," says Ron F. Green, former president of FPL Energy, the leading U.S. wind power generator and owner of the Mountaineer center.
With $2 billion invested in U.S. projects last year, wind energy is picking up; it is expected to provide about 6 percent of domestic power needs by 2020. (Europe remains the world leader in harnessing the wind; Denmark snatches 15 percent of its electricity from the air.)
The sudden race to build electricity-generating wind turbines in this part of the Alleghenies is driven by economics and politics: significant federal production tax credits, authorized by Congress this year, are guaranteed only for commercial wind generators in operation by the end of 2003.
With at least a six-month delay from order to delivery for the machines, there's not a lot of leeway in spinning new windmills.
