Oil-giant Texas and wind-energy giant Denmark are swapping information are their respective strong suits in energy.
This article in the Houston Chronicle says the Danes have become word leaders when it comes to wind energy generation, getting 25 percent of their electricity needs from the wind. Likewise, Texas has become a new leader in wind energy production, passing California as the top wind energy state, generating about one-fourth of the all U.S. wind power:
“In so many ways, we are modeling our wind energy industry on Denmark’s wind energy industry,” said Michelle Warren, the deputy commissioner overseeing renewable energy at the Texas General Land Office in Austin.
For example, Texas — like Denmark — has adopted a government requirement for wind energy. Texas has announced that 5,880 megawatts of energy are to come from renewable sources by 2015.
Like Denmark, Texas also offers government incentives such as direct grants for wind developers. “We do follow the policy incentives in Denmark, where there’s a belief that the government does have to offer incentives to the wind-energy industry,” Warren said.
It only seems fitting that Texas is now following Denmark’s wind energy lead, as Denmark has been known as “Little Texas” because it is Europe’s third largest oil producer, behind Norway and Britain.
The Danish Energy Authority predicts that Denmark will have ample oil and gas reserves for years to come and will tap into hundreds of oil engineers from Texas to keep up with that industry’s demands.