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About 50 people, including state officials, visited the largest wind farm in Texas last month for an open day to mark the end of the Lone Star state's Energy Independence Week. The attendance was high given that the 35 MW Van Horn wind farm in Culberson County, 100 miles east of El Paso, is so remote that it takes two days to get there and back from the state capital, Austin, said tour organiser Peter Tucker of the Lower Colorado River Authority. The utility buys power from the Kenetech turbines. Another high point of the week, in mid April, were preliminary results of a survey issued by the state Department of Commerce showing that more than 3000 people work in renewable energy in Texas, the country's second most populous state. The survey, to which more than 145 companies responded, also indicates that more than half of the companies have a market that extends beyond Texas or the US. Energy Independence Week was organised by the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development (SEED) Coalition. "The whole week went well; there was a great deal of participation," says Peter Altman of SEED.