Beyond oil: The Texan economy more diversified, but energy remains
The Texan economy is becoming ever more diversified, but energy remains a favourite
HIGHWAY 84, as it descends from Lubbock through Snyder to the small town of Sweetwater, is a road worth taking. Spread across the vast plain are thousands of windmills, gently turning in a favourable wind; not too slow, not too fast and, above all, fairly consistent.
Only as you draw near to one do you realise that these towers are the height of 40-storey buildings; their blades are the length of a jumbo jet’s wing. They are clever too. Without human intervention, they can turn their heads and alter the pitch of their blades to make the most of the wind. They cost about $5m apiece.
Sweetwater calls itself the windpower capital of America, and with roughly 3,300MW of installed capacity within a 50-mile (80km) radius the claim is not extravagant. Already endowed with oil and gas, Texas is blessed with a fair wind as well. Even stronger and more consistent winds are to be found further north along the “wind corridor” that stretches from the west Texas plains up through the panhandle and into Oklahoma and beyond. But for now these areas are too remote to be connected to any of America’s three main grids: the eastern, the western and Texas’s very own ERCOT grid.
