Wind Farm Shenanigans In Oregon; Oregonians Look Forward To Increased Monthly Utility Bills But At Least The

The best part of the very complicated story below is learning how to "flip" wind farm tax credits:

In the end, Caithness sold its three tax credits at a discount to WalMart and Comcast.

A reader sent me links to these two stories from The Oregonian. 

The first story:

The Oregon Department of Energy ignored its own rules, legislators' intent and taxpayers' interests in reaffirming its decision to define Shepherds Flat wind farm as three separate facilities and provide its owners three separate $10 million tax credits. The mammoth installation of turbines in eastern Oregon, developed by a New York company to slake California's thirst for renewable energy, started spinning last year.

The agency undertook a review in March of its earlier tax credit approvals for the wind farm after an investigation by The Oregonian raised questions about its eligibility for more than one tax credit. Lisa Schwartz, appointed in January as ODOE's fourth director in five years, signed off on the final two credits last month after what she described as a rigorous review in cooperation with the Department of Justice.

Yet limited and often non-responsive information about the review provided to The Oregonian suggests it was neither rigorous nor consistent with state rules governing tax credits. In its review, ODOE ignored clear evidence in its own files and additional records identified by The Oregonian that should have disqualified $20 million of the $30 million in tax credits. It failed to ask for contracts or other documentation to answer fundamental questions that state rules pose about ownership, financing, construction, operation and maintenance.

The second story:

For Shepherds Flat wind farm, the $30 million in tax credits that received final approval from Oregon Department of Energy last month were frosting on a multi-layered cake of federal, state and local subsidies. Its developers gorged themselves on hundreds of millions of dollars from taxpayers, and government officials were well aware it was over-subsidized.

At the White House, top advisors balked at the largesse for Shepherds Flat, warning President Obama of potential backlash as opportunistic developers "double dipped" on public money. In Oregon, the dicing of Shepherds Flat into three came in spite of state prohibitions against developers subdividing projects to garner multiple taxpayer subsidies. In Gilliam and Morrow counties, elected officials rolled with it too, slashing property taxes on the project and urging the state to sweeten the pot.

In the end, the lesson of Shepherds Flat may be that it was too big to fail. Its timing was ideal. Developers were offering the biggest wind farm in the world, a 338-turbine behemoth with a price tag of $2 billion, in eastern Oregon, in the midst of recession, using American-made turbines (never mind the Chinese towers).

And once the project gathered momentum, no bureaucrat was willing to stand in the way. 

Oregonians will get to see how much this will cost them when they see their utility bills. Compare price of wind vs hydroelectric power which is superabundant in the northwest.