According to The Associated Press (via the Air Force Times), the Defense Department Office of the Inspector General has found fault with an Air Force plan to replace diesel generators with wind turbines at radar installations in remote Alaska using millions in federal economic stimulus funds.

A test turbine, the audit says, was built at Tin City in 2008, northwest of Nome, without the benefit of a 12-month wind study. As of July, the turbine has produced "sporadic, unusable power," and the Air Force said via email that the facility is currently under repair.

The audit focuses on three Alaska projects subsequent to the Tin City turbine, estimated to cost $4.7 million each: Cape Newenham and Cape Romanzof in the Southwest, and Cape Lisburne in the Northwest, none of which have been built.

Auditors say that the projects have been rendered more expensive by delays, caused in part by deployments, lost paperwork and inadequate planning studies. They also say the Defense Department awarded the contracts to CH2M Hill Constructors Inc. without a documented cost-benefit analysis, without taking data from the Tin City turbine into account, and without determining whether the projects were "shovel-ready" enough to pay for with stimulus money.

The Air Force said via email that the Cape Newenham project has been dropped because a wind study indicated wind turbulence was too great at the site, but construction on the other two projects is scheduled to begin in late spring, with completion expected by November 2012.

Read much, much more, here.