I don't think she missed anything. In Rhode Island, industry really has become what the special interests can convince state government to buy from them.

I think there is a money trail here to be exposed.

"Google (GOOG) disclosed in a blog post this morning that on Friday it invested $38.8 million in a pair of North Dakota wind farms developed by NextEra Energy Resources, a unit of FPL Group (FPL)."

Hmmm, so either Justin is right or Google is right.....I pick Google.

Sigh, meanwhile the Germans move forward, happy to develop the technology we'll be buying from them in 20 years, while bemoaning "why don't we have more venture capital in Rhode Island?"

Profit potential fuels offshore wind ventures

The Germans aren't doing anything more technically advanced than companies funded by US venture capital are doing. False argument by phony example of non-superiority.

Go Nukes !!!

Another unresearched factoid that fails to support the commenter's point (that is, if he had a point). It is possible that there are wind projects that do not rely on government subsidies or government-mandated, extortionate pricing for financial viability. Perhaps that is one, although I doubt it. More likely there is government finagling that makes this a deal for Google.

Additionally, these clean energy deals benefit from tax credits which are leveraged by adding debt, so Google's tax benefits over the first 1-3 years would typically exceed the amount of its investment - free money at the taxpayers' expense for a deal whose cash flows are guaranteed by government. Sweet.

Of course, Bob, you forget to mention the vast amount of government help for oil and gas drilling - to the tune of 10's of billions in just the last couple of years!

And, you somehow missed the factoid about the nuclear power industry being unable to even exist (they could not get insurance!) without government actually passing a law that gives them immunity.

Oh, those inconvenient facts again!

It must be really easy to try to make a point when you simply apply blinders to everything else....which the government helped popularize....from THIS internet to the telegraph to the railroads to airplane travel.....Yep, it would not have happened as quickly if not for that big bad government.

On a basic intellectual level, though, you really MUST have some basis as to why wind energy is different than oil...why oil can be given credits, and not wind?

You must also have worked it out in your mind why Bush and Cheney were oil people, and yet must have had nothing to do with "blessing" oil.

Please enlighten us.

"The Germans aren't doing anything more technically advanced than companies funded by US venture capital are doing. False argument by phony example of non-superiority."

Perhaps, but they are doing something we're not doing in RI, creating jobs.

Failing German Shipyard Saved by Wind Power

Nordseewerke, a shipyard in Emden, Germany is undergoing a 40 million Euro refit as part of plans to transform the facility into a ‘hub' for offshore wind turbines. More than half of the 1,200 people who were working at the yard when the global economic crisis hit the shipbuilding industry in 2008 will now build underwater foundations, tripods, platforms and towers for offshore wind turbines.

And guess who's already buying from them?

It appears, however, that Germany has once again stolen a march when it comes to renewable energy. The UK implemented a feed-in-tariff a full ten years after the Germans and when the US approved its first offshore wind farm, Cape Wind, last week, it was also announced that the turbines are to be provided by the German company Siemens.