One of the things that surprised me about the WindPower 2008 show was that so many of the exhibitors primarily serve the oil and gas industry, and are now moving into wind. I expected to see a lot of pretty serious environmentalists- I’m not sure if I thought everyone would have long hair, beards, and Birkenstocks but I only saw about 2 people out of the 12,000 that fit that image. Mostly it was a sea of business people in suits.
We spoke with Cinco at length about this- Cinco is an land acquisition company in Houston that normally serves the oil industry. After decades of experience in this area, they’ve been moving into wind and geothermal- according to their representative at the booth, land acquisition for oil and gas vs. wind or geothermal is almost the same game. This same mantra was repeated over and over at multiple booths- some vendors told us the turbines in the wind industry weren’t so different to sell into than oil and gas turbines. Others told us the control panels were similar designs, still others talked to the legal issues, the environmental issues, the logistical issues and other power issues as very similar among the different types of energy generation.
I definitely got the feeling that the conference this year was so large for this very reason: It’s not that so many wind companies are being formed from scratch, it’s that so many traditional fossil fuel companies are now salivating over this market. Perhaps renewables have had a marginalized, outsider reputation, but now many serious, traditional companies are taking a hard look at this growing market. With 29 states now required to provide some portion of their power with renewable energy, the market should only continue to grow.
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