WHEATLAND, Wyo. - The man who came to Elsie Bacon's ranch house door in July asked the 71-year-old widow to grant access to a right of way across the dry hills and short grasses of her land here. Ms. Bacon remembered his insistence on a quick, secret deal.
The man, a representative of the Little Rose Wind Farm of Boulder, Colo., sought an easement for a transmission line to carry his company's wind-generated electricity to market. His offer: a fraction of the value of similar deals in the area. As Ms. Bacon, 71, recalled it: "He said, 'You sure I can't write you out a check?' He was really pushy."
...
Ms. Bacon did not agree to the deal from the Little Rose representative, Ed Ahlstrand Jr. Instead, she joined her neighbors in forming the Bordeaux Wind Energy Association - among the new cooperative associations whose members, in a departure from the local culture of privacy and self-reliance, are pooling their wind-rich land.
Now, I don't know who Mr. Ahlstrand is, and I'm reading about it all third-hand, but he and his company sure don't come out of the NYT article looking very good.
So what's Little Rose Wind Farm, anyways?
Check LRWF out on the web, and you'll find this site (also cached on Google, here). It's your basic five-page quickie web site. The home page describes their proposed site as being in "Zone 6 and Zone 7 according to the Wind resource map distributed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratories in Boulder Colorado."
Um, no.
NREL's not in Boulder. It's in Jefferson County, with the main facility in Golden. The National Wind Technology Center (NWTC), operated by NREL, is in northern Jefferson County, but the closest community in Boulder County is Superior. And what's that about "National Renewable Energy Laboratories?" The name on the NREL site is the singular: National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
Strangely enough, while Googling around on the topic, I found that LRWF isn't the only one having trouble with the NWTC location:
If you've never seen it, let me just say it'd be pointless to head up Clear Creek canyon to find it. Placement on map is indeed approximate.
Anyways, putting location aside for a moment, the 2nd link on the nav bar (below Home) is to something called Future Wind. The URL is to www.futurewind.org, a site which doesn't actually exist.
On the other hand, www.futurewind.net does exist (also cached), and it's registered to Mr. Ahlstrand. Bad link. Whoops.
The FW site is about as extensive a site as LRWF's. In addition to a few links, the home page states:
Powering our Future
We donate 100% of our revenues to Future Wind power sites.
Use the Apply Here link to get your own Future Wind Visa.
How much carbon can you save? Each megawatt...
That's it, folks. Nothing else but links and a note as to who developed the site (I don't think I'd like to advertise my web development services this way). I didn't even stick in the dot-dot-dot -- the content just ends there.
Fortunately, there's a link that appears related: Apply Here. (also cached) There's slightly less content there, namely:
Apply for a Future Wind Visa
Visa will presumably help out...
And no, I didn't put in the dots at the end here, either. Would I be presumptuous in supposing that VISA hasn't yet helped out?
The other link was a Contact Us page, but I'm not sure there's much future in futurewind.net, so enough side trip. Let's go back to LRWF.
The third of five nav bar links over there, after Home and Future Wind, is current conditions. (also cached). Check it out for yourself. Don't blink or you'll miss it.
There's the obligatory Contact Us page, as you'd expect, with details like those on the Future Wind site.
The last nav bar link must be last because it's best. Click on Investor's Corner (also cached), and you'll find this:
Investor's Corner
You give me money, we'll make more together...
I don't think so. Looks to me like this venture blows.
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