EoW July 2009

Transat lant ic Cable

harness o shore wind, as interests in New York, Michigan, and Ontario (Canada) push forward with competing studies and projects. “We need the public and the business community to get behind this,” said Mr Richard, whose foundation has invested heavily in the task force e ort. “Being second, third, or fourth will bring us nothing. This is a well-thought-out risk.”

Energy

A project to generate electricity from the Lake Erie winds is driven by interstate rivalry “We are in a race with the rest of the Midwest. Whoever gets in the water rst wins the race.” Cuyahoga County (Ohio) prosecutor Bill Mason was referring to the establishment of an o shore wind industry in his state, involving the placement of three to eight wind turbines on Lake Erie. The turbines, for the generation of electricity, would be clearly visible three miles out from Cleveland’s shoreline. Costs are estimated at $78 million to $93 million. Writing in the Cleveland Plain Dealer , Tom Breckenridge reported that the prospect of radical alteration to the lake vista has drawn little opposition from a populace eager for change in the economic landscape of the region. The results of a year-long feasibility study appear to encourage hopes of an industry in o shore wind utilisation and possibly thousands of new jobs. (‘Wind Turbines on Lake Erie,’ 1 st May) The feasibility study, for which an energy task force paid $1 million to a team led by the German company juwi GmbH, was a thorough job. It examined the technical, environmental, regulatory, and nancial aspects of launching a turbine demonstration project, together with related research, testing, and certi cation concerns. On the strength of the ndings, the task force – made up of city, county, civic, and business leaders – indicated it would le for state and federal permits to erect the turbines within three years, if not sooner. “The task force chairman acknowledges he was staggered by the costs,” wrote Mr Breckenridge, who also pointed out that pro tability is not imminent. Previous studies found average wind speeds over Lake Erie of over 16 miles per hour, the strongest in Ohio. Without subsidies, however, electricity from the pilot project would cost an uncompetitive 23 cents per kiloWatt-hour, as compared with 7 to 9 cents per kWh for electricity from Ohio’s land-based turbines. Mr Mason emphasised that the taxpayers of the county would bear none of the costs of the turbine pilot project, which would be alleviated by grants from the US Department of Energy, federal stimulus money, and the state of Ohio. The task force is pushing for more incentives at the state level to encourage the exploitation of o shore wind. And tax credits could help attract private investment. The Plain Dealer noted that M Torres Group, a company based in Pamplona, Spain, is talking with Ohio development o cials about investing millions of dollars in the wind turbine project, perhaps working out of a warehouse at the Port of Cleveland. Mr Mason said he has talked with a half-dozen large local companies about investing in the project. A likely booster would be Timken Co (Canton, Ohio), already a big supplier of roller bearings to turbine makers. The task force reported that Ohio is home to hundreds of companies selling parts to the wind energy industry. ❈ Cleveland Foundation president Ronn Richard acknowledged to the Plain Dealer that the pilot turbine project would be a “loss leader” – an initial outlay to be o set by future pro ts. But he asserted that Ohio must stay out front in the race to

Aviation

Wi-Fi aloft: the in- ight movie will be an inspirational David and Goliath story

The race to o er wireless networking Internet services to airplane passengers has been won – not by mighty Boeing but by another, much smaller, company, also Illinois-based. Privately held Aircell, with headquarters in Itasca, enables airlines to o er onboard access service within North America at reasonable fees. And airlines including United, American, Delta, AirTran, Virgin America, and Air Canada are speedily having it installed. AirTran (Orlando, Florida), which charges Gogo users $9.95 for ights under three hours, $12.95 for longer ights, will have the service available on its entire eet – 50 Boeing 737s and 86 Boeing 717s – by midsummer. Writing from Boeing’s hometown, David Greising, chief business correspondent for the Chicago Tribune , is well positioned to trace the unlikely success of Aircell’s Gogo over its big rival’s Connexion service. “At one point not long ago,” he noted, “Boeing had the highest aspirations for the onboard access business. Connexion by Boeing was supposed to be at the core of a ‘third leg’ of the company, holding share alongside commercial airplanes, with $28 billion in sales; and defense, with $32 billion.” Alas. Connexion, which bounced signals back and forth among satellites in space and Web-connected airplane passengers, cost $26.95 for a 24-hour period – an awkward block of time for travellers by air. Worse, it set a price- and weight-conscious airline back $1 million to install the cumbersome 800-pound machinery in a plane that had to be grounded for up to two weeks. The service was, said the Tribune, “a non-starter.” In 2006, Boeing gave it up, taking a $320 million pretax write-down of its investment. (“Boeing’s Ambitions Crushed Its Wi-Fi Project,” 19 th May) Meanwhile Aircell, of the “pint-size corporate pro le,” quietly went about developing the service that grew out of its founder’s sketch of arrows pointing from an airplane to a cellular tower to a house, and back. Development criteria were likewise simply stated. The company would rely on o -the-shelf technology. Its equipment would weigh less than 100 pounds. Installation, taking a plane out of service only overnight, would cost less than $100,000. The system is also cost-e ective in operation. Because most of the communication takes place in the air, Aircell can cover the US with only 92 cell towers. The one technological drawback of the land-based system is, of course, that it does not work on overseas ights. This is, Mr Greising said, “a development challenge Aircell will no doubt address as the business grows.”

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