COUNTY NOT PREPARED FOR WIND-POWER TURBINES

By Juan Montoya

Wind power first came to the Buffalo Ridge area in southwest Minnesota in early 2000.

Like Texas and other states, Minnesota was under a federal mandate that at least 10 percent of its energy be derived from renewable resources such as wind, solar and/or biomass.

But unlike Texas, the Gopher State took the mandate seriously and set about to address the challenges posed by having wind turbines suddenly pop out across the landscape.

The Buffalo Ridge, actually an escarpment rising from the flat farmland in Murray County, is just about the only high place for miles in the flat lands of Minnesota. However, its rising slopes provided the perfect elevation to harvest what wind there was available.

Unlike South Texas, where predominantly Southeast winds come in from the Gulf of Mexico in the summer and northern blasts whip through in the winter, its "wind budget" is somewhat limited. They, as they are wont to do, settled for the next best thing, building atop the ridge.

But they weren't satisfied with that. The folks in Minnesota figured that simply taxing the turbines for the limited real estate they physically occupy would not distribute the benefits across their communities and would simply benefit the turbine companies that would in turn sell the energy produced to utilities seeking to meet the federal requirements.

The state quickly set about to establish an energy production tax that would benefit school districts, municipalities, villages and counties where they were erected. With that in place, the income started coming in to the affected areas. The way they figured, if the communities were going to put up with the massive structures that would one day dot the landscape, they should get something in return. Last year, that amounted to some $4.5 million in Murray County, in the middle of the state.

However, it didn't end there. Murray County, for example, as did other counties, drafted a wind-energy ordinance that specifies the size, placement, environmental consideration and construction guidelines for the erection of the turbines.

I think of this as I read the front-page story in the Brownsville Herald where turbines are being proposed for rural Cameron County out by the county airport. The county has no guidelines for these structures other than concerns by individual commissioners.
And a cursory search of the City of Brownsville building code indicates that it contains nary a word about the construction, placement and requirements for the erection of wind turbines. Neither does the county's subdivision ordinance.

In fact, the only mention of towers relates to height restrictions that would interfere with airplane traffic.

And nowhere in the State of Texas is there a provision to allow communities to tax the energy produced by these companies to benefit the communities where they alight.

We can talk about the benefit's of renewable energy until we're blue in the face. But until we codify their existence here, we will be behind the eight ball at the mercy and whim of these new industries with nothing but the structures to show for it.