T. Boone Pickens has released his new energy plan and this time it doesn’t include spending on wind power. According to Roll Call, “With wind energy projects not proving as financially viable as he anticipated, Pickens has tabled the renewable energy portion of his acclaimed Pickens Plan for clean energy and turned his focus exclusively to increasing development of natural gas.”

In spite of this, the Republicans in the North Carolina legislature continue to refuse to consider repeal of the state’s renewable energy portfolio standard (SB3) which mandates that electricity customers in NC pay extra for electricity generated by wind power. The difference between Pickens and the NC Legislature is that Pickens is not in the pocket of Duke Power, the state’s largest monopoly. There are special interest benefits in SB3 for Duke which were put there when the bill was passed in 2007 as a way of making sure that Duke supported it. Now we are stuck with both wind power and the big subsidies to the utilities. Apparently for our current legislature two wrongs do make a right so long as one of the wrongs is supported by a powerful special interest.