page_title: Equinox Mountain
section_title: Wind farming
hierarchical_section_title: Equinox Mountain / Wind farming
caption_attribution_description: English: The 100kW US Windpower wind turbines were installed on Little Equinox Mountain in Bennington County, VT from 1990-1994.
context_page_description: Equinox Mountain is a mountain in Bennington County, Vermont, United States, in the town of Manchester. The mountain is the highest peak of the Taconic Range, and the highest point of Bennington County. It is one of thirteen peaks in Vermont with a topographic prominence over 2,000 feet, ranked third behind Mansfield and Killington. Equinox is the second highest peak in southern Vermont, after Stratton Mountain.
context_section_description: Adjacent to the larger Equinox Mountains is Little Equinox, where two wind farms have previously operated.  One wind turbine was installed in 1981 and three more in 1982, making Little Equinox Mountain the site of one of the first wind farms in the United States. These turbines, an early-generation design by WTG Systems of Buffalo, New York, were mounted on 80-foot (24 m) truss towers and had a nominal peak output of 350 kW. The turbines, however, were plagued with mechanical issues, and by the mid-1980s all four were out of service, standing idle on the mountain from 1985 through 1989.
  Green Mountain Power began operating the site in 1988, erecting a wind measurement tower and removing the four old turbines. It installed two U.S. Windpower 100 kW turbines in 1990, which ran for four years making electricity. Green Mountain Power removed its turbines and measurement tower in 1994. The company now owns the Searsburg Wind Farm in Searsburg, Vermont.
  Endless Energy Corporation, a wind farm development company based in Maine, has expressed interest in the site for a modern wind farm. They have conducted wind measurements as well as environmental studies of Little Equinox Mountain. To build a wind farm in Vermont, the developer needs to go through the Public Service Board's Section 248 application process.
caption: Second wind farm on Little Equinox (1990–94)
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