Renewable powers join forces: (Combining wind & solar)

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.oregonlive.com/business/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1200704124274540.xml&coll=7

Renewable powers join forces

Energy - A Washington wind-solar plant is testing whether two fickle sources can create one reliable supply

Sunday, January 20, 2008
GAIL KINSEY HILL
The Oregonian

Puget Sound Energy has blanketed a rock quarry atop central Washington's Whisky Dick Mountain with solar modules in an unprecedented effort to test the compatibility of sun and wind energy.

More than 2,000 panels stretch squat and angular alongside the tall, sweeping turbine blades of the utility's Wild Horse wind farm near Ellensburg.

Nowhere else in the country has a utility tried to marry such different, distinctively fickle sources of electricity generation. Yet the elements' uneven temperaments are precisely what the utility finds attractive.

"We want to track the power profiles of each to see if there's a way to balance the two, to see if we can fill in the wind gaps with solar," said Steve St. Clair, PSE's manager for renewable assets.

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[ProgressIn2008]

1. Interesting, will keep an eye out for developments on this, thanks.