A one-year extension of the tax credit for the wind industry was included in the fiscal cliff deal that Congress passed yesterday. The tax credit, which was critical to GE Energy staying open in Pensacola, is worth 2.2 cents per kilowatt-hour of energy produced by new wind installations for their first 10 years of operation.
The GE Energy Pensacola plant assembles the GE 1.5-megawatt (MW) wind turbine. This unit is the workhorse of GE’s wind turbine offerings and is the market leader in that segment. Pensacola has delivered 8,000 units since production started in 2002, according to a company website.