Blow Me Over: The Tipping Point for Wind Has Come

Among the many things to be thankful for this holiday season is the fact that renewable energy finally has a legitimate place at the energy dinner table. No longer the poor cousins, hoping for an invite, wind and solar are on the guest list and they’ve brought a dish to pass.

We know that prices have been coming down. This year, a number of utility companies have been power purchase agreements for solar and wind at prices below natural gas, which had only recently underpriced coal. It’s true that these rock bottom prices were helped along by subsidies that are set to expire soon. Uncertainty over whether or not the Production Tax Credit would be renewed has hampered wind development this past year, which is why analysts continue to argue for a carbon tax.

But, prices are coming down to the point where renewables can be competitive without them. Here are a couple of examples.

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RP Siegel, author and inventor, shines a powerful light on numerous environmental and technological topics. He has been published in business and technical journals and has written three books. His third, co-authored with Roger Saillant, is Vapor Trails, an eco-thriller that is being adapted for the big screen. RP is a professional engineer – and a prolific inventor, with 50 patents, numerous awards, and several commercial products. He is president of Rain Mountain LLC and is an active environmental advocate in his hometown of Rochester, N.Y. In addition to Justmeans, he writes for Triple Pundit, ThomasNet News, and Energy Viewpoints, occasionally contributing to Mechanical Engineering, Strategy + Business, and Huffington Post. You can follow RP on Twitter, @RPSiegel.