30 per cent savings to come from wind

Wind power could be supplying up to 30 per cent of our power on Rarotonga in the near future. But it all depends on the landowners who are being asked to provide the land where the windmills are to be installed.
According to Tangi Tereapii of the Ministry of Energy, they are to meet with landowners next Thursday 3 July at 6pm at the Tupapa Meeting House. At this meeting they will show the landowners from six different plots of land, the results of wind data collected from the hill in Tupapa over the last year.
He says they had already met with landowners last year to ask for permission to put up the measuring equipment.
The monitoring was supposed to run for two years but with the urgency for renewable energy sources, and since the data collected already is promising, they have had to fast track the project to compete with the rising fuel costs.
The Ministry have opted for wind out of other possible sources such as solar and the ocean current as it is more economical, and network-wise the most appropriate.
Tereapii says that we could see wind turbines in about three to four years time.
From a consumer point of view, this is too long.
Tereapii says that they will soon be preparing an energy efficiency and conservation package for homes and businesses. It basically encourages people to use efficient appliances (5-star) and lights, learn how to read their meters and plot their daily consumption.
The Alternative Energy Committee which was set up last year to put in place a renewable energy policy gave Cabinet an update earlier this week.
Tereapii says the policy is important as it will remove barriers for people wanting to invest in renewable energy.
The role of the Ministry of Energy is to look at alternative energy and ways of reducing the country’s dependency on imported fuel within the power sector, to look at how to minimise consumption of power or energy conservation, and then to look at the standard of imported petrol products.

Headlines : Times 258 07 July 2008
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Headlines : Times 257 30 June 2008
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Headlines : Times 256 23 June 2008
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