By Peter A. Buxbaum Texas ports along the Gulf of Mexico are the among the nation’s leaders in the handling of imported wind energy equipment. These massive components, consisting or towers, turbines, and other large and heavy pieces are typically transported inland to wind farms located in Texas, or further north, in the Midwest. From a purely logistical point of view, to avoid the necessity of the difficult move of huge pieces of equipment over the road, it could make sense to build a wind farm right on port property. That is at least part of the logic behind just such a wind generation project at the port Corpus Christi. The Harbor Sunrise Industrial Wind Power project, the brainchild of Tibor Hegedus, general manager the Colorado-based startup Revolution Energy, LLC, is currently being built on a corner of port property at Corpus Christi. The energy generation enterprise is expected to be running and online early next year. “A whole host of issues were involved in the siting of this wind energy project,” said Hegedus. “The port is an industrial area with available land and appeared to be a good fit. It is also an area with intensive energy usage. The electricity will be going into the general grid but the port will also benefit from the generation of this power.” Revolution Energy is is a veteran-owned small business based in Colorado Springs, Col., develops renewable energy projects in the United States. The Corpus Christi project is Revolution’s first in which it will own and operate a wind farm. The farm, located on the north side of the port of Corpus Christi’s inner harbor, is thought to be the first wind energy farm located on industrial port property in North America. “Our port is proud to be one of America’s wind energy port leaders,” said John LaRue, the port’s executive director. “The Revolution Energy project marks a step forward towards the port’s support to the future of clean energy.” Revolution Energy began developing the project on 2006. The completed project will include installation of a total of six wind turbines at a cost of $20 million. The wind farm begins is expected to generate 30 million kilowatt hours per year of clean energy, equivalent to the electricity needs of around 2,500 homes. “With this project we are transitioning from energy project developer to owner,” said Hegedus. “It started with the backing of friends and family. Once we attracted a critical mass behind the development activity it became easier to attract additional investors.” “The idea came from Tibor Hegedus,” said LaRue. “He came up with the idea of putting a wind farm at the perimeter of port property. It uses land on the edge of a dredge placement area that we can’t use for much of anything else. The project is not taking up a big footprint of port land and we think it is a fantastic use of land that otherwise would be sitting there unused.” “The port was pretty receptive to the idea early on,” said Hegedus. “The port’s leadership exhibited great foresight in terms of energy markets. They saw how many turbines and other wind components were flowing through the port and knew that wind could be good business for the port and not just in terms of being a transportation hub.” “We are probably the number one or number two wind energy port in the gulf and among the top five nationally,” said LaRue. “The east coast is the only place where more wind equipment is being handled.” Texas is the leading state in the union for the development of wind energy projects, according to Sandy Sanders, the port’s deputy director of operations. “We have nine wind energy manufacturers using the port,” he said. “It has become a very exciting opportunity.” “The project will generate some revenue for the port but not huge dollars,” said LaRue. “The project is located near the liquid bulk docks and it is symbolic of the fact that we need both kinds of energy. A baseball stadium is being planned for the other side of the channel. If that comes about, fans are going to see the wind turbines right