Texas partnership joins forces for renewable energy

A forward-thinking partnership between the Texas General Land Office (GLO) and the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) has ensured a bright future for wind energy in the heart of Texas oil country.

At the announcement of the Texas Wind Power Project in 1994, Texas Land Commissioner Garry Mauro called the project a "win-win-win, or wind-wind-wind situation" for environmentalists, economic development, and improved quality of life for Texans. Just over three years later, the GLO still sees its renewable energy venture as a resounding success.

The GLO manages about 20.6 million acres of state land and mineral rights, including hundreds of thousands of acres in windy West Texas. The agency deposits money into the Permanent School Fund (PSF), primarily derived from oil and gas leases on the land which it manages. Since the PSF's inception in 1854, the GLO has deposited $6.5 billion into the fund, including about $2.8 billion since 1983.

The fund has a market value of more than $12.3 billion and provides more than $215 per student in educational assistance to public schools across Texas every year.

As the former chair of the Texas Sustainable Energy Development Council (SEDC), Mauro helped craft a strategic plan to integrate renewables such as wind, solar, and biomass into the Texas energy mix. In the early 1990s, Texas was an energy importer. SEDC members, including the LCRA and Kenetech Windpower Corporation, saw an opportunity to reverse that situation using renewables to meet Texans' growing energy needs and ensure sustained economic growth.

The GLO, LCRA, and Kenetech Windpower worked to create the Texas Wind Power Project, an effort to tap the excellent West Texas wind resource and diversify sources of revenue for the Permanent School Fund. Today, this 35-MW project in Culberson County generates enough electricity for 10,000 - to 12,000 homes.

The LCRA is a self-supporting public utility created by the Texas Legislature in 1934 as a conservation and reclamation district. Its service territory includes 10 counties along the Colorado River. Until 1993, the LCRA was not allowed to generate power outside its service territory on a long-term basis. However, in 1993, legislation was approved, allowing the LCRA to generate power outside its service territory as long as it was generated on lands managed by the GLO using renewable resources.

From the beginning, Commissioner Mauro saw the Texas Wind Power Project as "ushering in a new energy era for Texas." Citing a Pacific Northwest Laboratories study, Mauro emphasized that Texas has ten times the wind resources of California, and wind is capable of producing enough electricity to meet 10 percent of Texas' total energy needs.

At the project's opening in November 1995, Mauro told the assembled guests, "I can't think of an industry in this state with a brighter future than the wind energy industry. It harnesses one of the most cost-effective, readily available energy sources Texas has. It's good for the local economy, good for the environment." The revenues from the lease of the land would mean an additional $3 million for the Permanent School Fund over the life of the Texas Wind Power Project.

Despite some obstacles, including the demise of the Texas SEDC and Kenetech's bankruptcy filing, Texas' investment in wind power has paid off. In October 1996, the LCRA and the GLO received the U.S. Department of Energy's Utility Technology Award for their effort to develop the project.