NYS plans wind turbines along highway

BUFFALO -- The state Thruway Authority plans to put five wind turbines along the highway in western New York to power some of the agency's facilities.

Thruway officials said the medium-scale turbines will be on state property near the Lake Erie shoreline in Erie and Chautauqua counties, between Buffalo and the Pennsylvania border. The three-bladed turbines will rise no higher than 150 feet, less than half the height of some of the mega-windmills already constructed along Lake Erie.

The agency plans to have the first windmill built at Fredonia's Exit 59 sometime next year. Others are planned for Exit 57A in Evans, Exit 58 in Silver Creek and Exit 61 at Ripley, near the Pennsylvania line. Another would be at the agency's maintenance facility near Exit 60 in Westfield.

The authority says up to $4.8 million has been budgeted for the cost of the five turbines. Each will produce at least 100 kilowatts per hour of power, and excess energy not used by the agency at its Western New York facilities will be sold back to local utilities.

-- Buffalo News, AP