Environmental groups have organized a daylong "Maryland Citizen's Conference" this Saturday (12/4) in Annapolis to press for more rapid development of wind energy projects off the state's Atlantic coast.

Anxious to break what they see as a logjam in developing wind energy in Maryland, activists want the next General Assembly to pass legislation requiring the state's electricity providers to sign long-term contracts agreeing to buy power from offshore projects.  They believe that the lack of such commitments are preventing developers from getting the financing they need to move ahead with putting turbines a dozen or so miles off Ocean City.

The conference comes as two land-based industrial wind projects in western Maryland are about to begin generating electricity.  But most proponents see the Outer Continental Shelf as a much more promising locale for generating significant amounts of electricity from steady offshore winds - not to mention possibly avoiding some of the nagging controversies over the impacts of mountaintop turbines on migratory bats and birds.

The conference is meant to build political pressure on the legislature a month before it convenes.  Scheduled speakers include leading green lawmakers, a wind developer, a union leader and a CEO from the Google-linked partnership that proposes to build transmission lines to bring mid-Atlantic offshore power to land.  Activists plan to march on the State House at the end. 

The session runs from 10 a.m. to 3:30 pm at the Westin Hotel, 100 Westgate Circle, Annapolis.  Admission is $15, $10 for students. For more, go here.

(Wind turbines off northern German island of Borkum, April 2010.  David Hecker/AFP/Getty Images)