Shale gas boom leaves US wind power developers gasping for air.

The $14-billion wind power industry, the world's second-largest buyer of wind turbines, is reeling from a double blow -- cheap natural gas unleashed by the fracking revolution and the death last year of federal subsidies that made wind the most competitive of all renewable energy sources in the US.

Without restoration of subsidies, worth $23 per megawatt hour to turbine owners, the industry may not recover, and the US may lose ground in its race to reduce dependence on the fossil fuels driving global warming, say wind-power advocates.

They place the subsidy argument in the context of fairness, pointing out that wind's chief fossil-fuel rival, the gas industry, is aided by the ability to form master limited partnerships that allow pipeline operators to avoid paying income tax. This helps drive down the cost of natural gas.

'If gas prices weren't so cheap, then wind might be able to compete on its own,' said South Dakota's Republican Governor Dennis Daugaard. Consider that gas averaged $8.90 a million British thermal units in 2008 and plunged to $3.73 last year, making the fuel a cheaper source of electricity for utilities.