By Timothy B. Wheeler, The Baltimore Sun
12:27 a.m. EST, December 13, 2010
While Maryland’s energy future might lie in harnessing the breezes off Ocean City, the frontier for now is in the same place it’s always been — in the mountains of Western Maryland — where the region’s winds and coal and natural gas reserves are drawing prospectors.
That’s unsettling to some environmentalists and Western Marylanders, who fear the impact of new and traditional energy development on the region’s rich natural resources, its outdoors-oriented tourist industry and its rural quality of life.
Maryland’s first two industrial-scale wind “plants” are on the verge of generating power atop the state’s highest mountain in Garrett County. Though their construction stirred concerns over harming rare bats and disturbing forested vistas, a new string of them is being planned for another ridgetop.
