Wind company shuts doors in Rutland

RUTLAND, Vt. - A Connecticut company working to install a wind-power project on Grandpa's Knob in Castleton, Vt., is closing its Rutland office.

Brad King, the local project manager for Essex, Conn.-based Noble Environmental Power, says the company has not given up plans for the wind farm in Vermont and will continue to gather data from meteorological towers installed on the ridge last year.

In October, the company laid off workers in New York and stopped work at two wind farms in that state in connection with the failure of Lehman Brothers, one of its chief backers.

Noble's CEO Walter Howard released a brief statement Monday saying the poor economic outlook prevents the company from speculating on its 2009 development plans. (AP, with information from the Rutland Herald.)