The answer, they say, is blowing in the wind

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Kempe said the hope is that, if the Rhode Island project to set eight wind turbines off the shore of Block Island, and thus provide the island with electrical power, is the first wind turbine project to come to completion, companies that manufacture materials related to the industry will relocate to Rhode Island.

"Most of the companies ancillary to the wind power industry are currently located in Europe, where there are several offshore wind farms," Kempe said. "We think they would like bases in America, when the offshore wind industry is active here. And if there is an active project here in Rhode Island, we think we can attract them and their jobs."

Kempe explained that a preliminary mapping project must first be completed before the state can begin a permitting process for the Block Island project. She said Rhode Island hoped to have permits issued before the end of the year, so that actual construction could start as early as next year.

The eight-windmill Block Island project would be followed by a larger project of 110 turbines 15 miles out to sea.

"That would be in federal waters and will require federal permits, and that process can take between 5 and 7 years," Kempe said. "We don't think it should take that long."

In Massachusetts, the oldest offshore wind power project, the Cape Winds project, received a boost in April 2010 when the federal government officially approved the effort, which aims to place 130 wind turbines off the shore of Nantucket Island. The project has been alive for 10 years, but now has found a purchaser for the energy it promises to produce and there is speculation that construction could begin as early as the end of this year.

Delaware recently received permission from the federal Department of Interior to start the bidding process on its proposed offshore wind farm.

Bluewater Wind, developer of wind farms, is looking to construct a 150-turbine field 12.5 miles off the Delaware coast that could produce 230 to 450 megawatts of power.  The $800 million project would generate more than 1,000 jobs during construction, and produce millions of dollars in revenue for the state each year.

The Delaware legislature passed a law requiring that, by 2019, 20 percent of the state's electricity come from renewable sources. Delmarva Power has signed a 25-year power purchase agreement with Bluewater Wind to sell the utility up to 200 megawatts of power, once the wind turbines are up and producing.

But, as is the case in Rhode Island, the time it takes to get federal permits can set the project back years.

Responding to these concerns, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar has promised to work to streamline the permitting process.

"We realize the importance of the federal government streamlining its processes so that we are able to move forward in the permitting of renewable energy projects in the offshore in a much quicker time than has happened in the past," Salazar said in February.

Salazar said his department is working to make the rules clearer and to combine two environmental impact studies, now required, into one. He said he hopes to cut the permitting time in half. The consortium of 11 states should also contribute to speeding up the process.

While the bureaucracy seeks to streamline the permitting process, Congress, if it passes the Clean Energy Bill as the Administration desires, may shift more funding and technical assistance towards wind power, which would give an added boost to the industry.

In a release, the American Wind Energy Association, a strong proponent of the Clean Energy Bill currently in committee in the U.S. Senate, quoted a 2009 Department of Energy study saying that "for an investment costing the average American household less than a can of soda a month, wind power could generate 20% of the nation's electricity by 2030 -- as much as nuclear power today."