This story reminded of an idea that keeps popping up in my head. I have often wondered if, here in Ecotopia, there would be support for windfarms like these. I know there are some planned along the Canada-US border as well as others in place in Oregon.
But my pipe dreamplan is more ambitious and it ties in with another technology we like here in the Puget Sound area. My idea would be to take the technology we use in our popular floating bridges and build a wind farm at sea, off the Pacific coast. The wind never seems to stop blowing, from what I recall on my visits, and it would be possible to build them far enough offshore to render them invisible to residents and tourists alike.
There are some issues, like the cost of building the floating infrastructure (essentially the same concrete pontoons we use in bridges) at such a distance from land. But I see advantages as well. No land need be purchased to make this work, and expanding capacity might be cheaper as costs come down, rather than higher as land appreciates. The sea-based platforms would be off the flyways, minimizing birdstrikes and other hazards.
A single windmill generating 3.6 megawatts of energy, day and night, seems pretty amazing to me. A hundred of them would be something to see. If they are as self-sufficient as the article suggests, this could be a very effective means of generating low-cost energy in a scalable way.