Bay County official suggests wind power royalties should be shared with all residents

Next Era Energy, a Florida company that operates 75 wind parks across the U.S. and Canada, as well as the Point Beach nuclear power plant in Wisconsin, is planning a 66 turbine 100 megawatt commercial wind park in Bay and Tuscola Counties.

Jeff Kart of the Bay City Times reports that Bay County Executive Thomas L. Hickner has suggested that the company consider sharing royalties from the windmills with all of the residents of the rural farming communities where the project is planned.

Kart writes that the power company says it has secured agreements with 10 landowners who are willing to have the 400 foot high turbines installed on their land in exchange for a share of the electricity sales.

Agreements will need to be reached with a total of 75 landowners to allow for the project, including some in Saginaw County’s Blumfield Township, to allow for transmission lines.

Each 1.5-megawatt, General Electric turbine will require about one acre of land, including access roads …

It will be interesting to see if payments to residents near the windmills could make the project more acceptable to those with concerns.

The idea of community payments has also surfaced in presentations about a 100 square mile wind park proposed off the shore of Ludington.

That project, proposed by Havgul Energy and Scandia Wind, would involve as many as 200 wind turbines that would stand 300 feet above the water, 3.7 miles off shore, and produce 1,000 megawatts of electricity.