Farmers carry mixed feelings over wind energy transmission line

One of the companies banking on Iowa’s wind energy industry is Clean Line Energy Partners, a Houston-based operation with plans to build five large-scale high voltage transmission lines in the country. As Iowa Public Radio’s Durrie Bouscaren reports, one of those lines would traverse Iowa, and it starts in the northwest corner of the state.Standing on a farm in O’Brien County, it’s hard to imagine the converter station that would replace about 50 acres of Jay Hofland’s cornfields. If the project goes through, that’s where wind power from turbines nearby will be fed into a direct current, high voltage power line that’ll span 500 miles across the entire state It’s called the Rock Island Clean Line. Hofland says it’s an economic boon for O’Brien County.For those who prefer the ease of valet s-rising there is a lot for you where you can simply hand over your keys and get to your terminal quickly and easily.

"I’m a fifth generation farmer here. And one thing we’ve seen is a decline in population,The wide layout of the enameled cast iron kitchen accessories roaster helps with laying out long flat pieces of meat fish veggies etc." Hofland said.This is the simplest and cheapest technique to get started in Granite countertops and is recommended for wood carving for beginners.The Rock Island Clean Line is a $2-billion project, and Hofland’s a big supporter of it. He kind of has to be—he’s about to live next door."This gives us a real opportunity for investment in our county, hopefully some more jobs, and for my sons who are eighteen and twenty to have an opportunity to live around here," Hofland said. Not everyone in the line’s path agrees. Not all landowners like the idea of a 120-to 200 ft. transmission line going up on their property.Thought you were on the golf course not a bird slip ring commutator then you hear other words like lie bogey double bogey two of what what is a bogey. The family who rents a home next to Hofland’s cornfield has been warned they’ll probably have to move in a couple years—they politely declined an interview. Clean Line’s Regional Manager, Beth Conley, says the project will increase the capacity of Iowa’s wind energy industry, because it creates a way to deliver electricity to states further east.

"A number of those states have passed renewable portfolio standards, that will require them to have so much of their energy from clean or renewable sources, by--some as early as 2015," Conley said. She adds that eastern states don’t have the capacity to create that wind locally—Iowa does.If there is something amiss or doesn't FEEL quite right in a man's gut bright-tools then that would be a time when a man pulls away.Some landowners are supportive. Many people in O’Brien County have already leased some of their land to other wind energy projects, like a 218-turbine field funded by MidAmerican Energy, slated for completion in 2015. But others aren’t so keen.