Welcome to the grazing grass podcast episode 122.
But the main thing is listen. Listen, and, you know, put, put, put your brain to it and see if it works good for your operation.
You're listening to the Grazing Grass Podcast, sharing information and stories of grass based livestock production utilizing regenerative practices. I'm your host, Cal Hardage. You're growing more than grass. You're growing a healthier ecosystem to help your cattle thrive in their environment. You're growing your livelihood by increasing your carrying capacity and reducing your operating costs. You're growing stronger communities and a legacy to last generations.
The grazing management decisions you make today. impact everything from the soil beneath your feet to the community all around you. That's why the Noble Research Institute created their Essentials of Regenerative Grazing course to teach ranchers like you easy to follow techniques to quickly assess your forage production and infrastructure capacity. In order to begin grazing more efficiently. Together, they can help you grow not only a healthier operation, but a legacy that lasts.
Learn more on their website at noble. org slash grazing. It's n o b l e dot org forward slash grazing.
On today's episode, we are doing something a little bit different. A while back Danny Esposito reached out to me from CROP America about the potential of having a renewable energy expert on our show. Which as you know, our show focuses on stories of regenerative ag and our Wednesday episodes focus on that. However, since we've added the Friday episode in, I thought this is perfect for the Friday episode. Danny's goal in reaching out to me, was just to provide information about renewable energy.
So those people who are facing a decision about it., Can make a more informed decision. That's the goal. So he put me in contact and he got set up with Dennis Stout. For Dennis to come on the podcast and discuss renewable energy. Dennis Stout is also the Wind Farm Guy. You can find him windfarmguy.com. And Dennis is a wind energy expert. He's worked on dozens of wind energy projects with both developers and land owners.
Dennis has a great amount of knowledge when it comes to how, when energy projects affect rural America and considerable experience with real world cases. So today we welcome Dennis onto the show to share and we go through renewable energy. What it is, what it looks like. And then we wrap up with questions that were submitted by the Grazing Grass Community. I'd put a post there. And said, what questions do you want asked? So any question that was posted, we asked it.
And I'm, I'm pretty sure I got to everyone's if I missed yours, I apologize. But I think I have every question that was posted, uh, asked today on the show. My hope with this helps you make an informed decision about your thoughts on wind energy. I know in my area of Oklahoma and I talked about a little bit when we're interviewing Dennis. That. Uh, it's a controversial topic. We have some, some farms and ranches. Uh, to the north of me, that's leased their land to wind energy companies.
And there's a fairly large fraction that's completely against it. And right down the road, there is a "say no to wind turbines" sign on the fence. And when I thought about the issue, I thought. I don't know enough to make an informed decision. So our goal for today. It's to help you make an informed decision. I will list any resources in the show notes. So you're able to go there for more information. If you'd like to have a discussion a Grazing Grass Community post there.
Um, but enough of all this. Let's get to the interview and talk to Dennis.
Dennis, we want to welcome you to the Grazing Grass Podcast. We're excited you're here today.
Thank you. I'm glad to be here. Thanks for inviting me.
Dennis, to get started, tell us a little bit about yourself.
I am I've been in the renewable industry for, oh goodness, 18 years now. Spent most of my time doing development work and land acquisition for the most part. I also make videos and things relative to the wind industry. Because as there's a, there are a lot of questions out there. And where do people go for the answers to those questions? They go to the internet, which is full of a lot of, there are some good answers out there, but there's a lot of baloney too.
And several years back, I started this video series called Wind Farm Guy, and and they're really just taking questions that I've received from all the different landowners that I have visited with, and giving real world answers for those. And I've been doing that, I have well over a hundred videos on my YouTube channel. And that, that's what I do. That's my, my passion, but what I pay the bills with is I work for a wind and solar developer and I with them for a number of years now. It is,
conversation is very apt timed because just in my area of Oklahoma, northeast Oklahoma, I live in Craig County, there's been a lot of discussion over the last six to ten months about wind turbines. There's been some farms leased to some companies and now we have signs posted up say no to wind turbines.
I, I do think there's a little, it's a little ironic one of the signs is posted on one side of the road and across the road was 2, 000 acres that was mined for coal and That does a lot to the area, that mining. So I think that's interesting. So I think it's a great time, at least for my area, to have a discussion and find out some facts and maybe dispel some myths, but just be transparent and let people know. People know what's going on. So to get started, Dennis, what is renewable energy?
I think just a basic question like that.
that is, that comes from a source that has does not have a finite amount, you're not gonna run out of wind, you're not gonna run out of sunshine. That makes it renewable. And whereas everything else there's only a certain amount of oil, only a certain amount of coal, only a certain amount of those things. And so they're not renewable.
So when we're talking about this, we're talking about wind and solar projects. And when we think about a utility scale project, how big is one of those projects versus just a backyard project or something?
They're pretty good sized. You have to recognize they are power plants. And so the, a turbine, when I started doing this 18 years ago, we were installing one megawatt, one and a half megawatt turbines. And today the turbines that are being installed are five, six megawatts, something like that. And so they're significant in size. And the, a big difference in.
One of a project of these in and what you might have on your home is Because they are power plants and I know everything is a power plant even the Backup generator at your house is it's considered a power plant.
But these really are power plants and Because of that in order to inject that power into the grid there is a Q process that the wind companies and solar companies have to go through and where the engineers do, study it and they make sure that it's a good thing for the grid, which is what you and I want. What we want is as homeowners and such, we want to be able to go over and flip that light switch on the wall and the lights come on.
And that's what the grid operator, that's their job is to make sure that is a very consistent thing. And so they study it very closely.
Oh, yeah. Just to north of me, we have all these properties been leased by wind energy companies. So what's the process for that to become a wind farm? Not necessarily the lease for the farmer at this point, that's something we want to talk about in a little bit, but just getting that going to the point that they're producing electric.
Okay to begin with, there are several things that have to come together for an area to even be a viable wind site. First of all, there's got to be good wind there. You have to have willing landowners. And you have to have available transmission line with available capacity on the transmission line. And then there you have to have a favorable permitting that might be, at the county level or state level or whatever so that They just, it has to be favorable to allow for turbines to be in that area.
And then finally the sales price for the electricity has to make sense and it has to be favorable. And so when those five things line up, that could be a viable location for a wind farm. And then the wind company will send in their crew, someone like me, to go and talk to the landowners, talk to the county folks and the people, the leadership in the area, schools, superintendents, and so on, and talk to them to get their Get their feel on things. Talk to the landowners and get them on board.
Do they want to be a part of a wind farm? And if they do get them leased, and then then all the, once the land is done, then the engineers get involved and financial people. And then they're the ones that really do the work. They're the smart guys that get all that stuff figured out. And so anyway, you get, once all of that stuff is done, then the construction crews come in and the wind farm is built. And once it's operational, it goes into operations and it starts generating electricity.
What kind of time frame are you talking about from time they start leasing land or they've identified an area to, and just assuming they're getting green lights and they're able to get the land leased, communities in support and everything? How long does it take to get a functioning wind farm going at that point?
It, it really depends on the area, but it'll take several years.
Oh, yeah.
And I will say that a second phase generally goes a whole lot faster. Because you already have made the relationships with the county and you've jumped through some of those hoops already and so it just it's much, much quicker. But your first phase of a wind farm or solar farm can be, five, six years or more. Most development time There's an agreement.
And at the very front side of the development process is called they call it different things, but it's a development time where they're trying to lease all the land and when all that's taken place. And that generally is about five years. So the idea is within that five years, it will be in construction.
And one of the first things you said for wind energy, you've got to have enough wind. Is there certain parts of North America, is there certain areas that are better, more favorable for wind, certain areas that you can, wouldn't even consider it?
Oh, absolutely. If you were to see a map of the United States showing the wind resources, it's in this central part of the United States, really east of the Rocky Mountains. And it would be, it would include Texas and then up through Oklahoma and Illinois and Indiana and it goes to the northeast a little bit. The southeast part of the country has horrible wind resources and so you don't see wind farms in the southeast part of the United States.
Oh, okay.
Now there's there's also some areas offshore, you're starting to see those CROP up in the northeast and they'll be happening on the Pacific side as well. But again, there have to be near load, near a city for for that to make sense.
And when these come in, how's it affect the farmers and ranchers in that area?
Actually it's very favorable. Effect on farmers and ranchers. It's a wind turbine only takes, oh, let's say an acre. Not even an acre really, but just that's what's disturbed during the construction process. The footprint of a turbine is very small. It's less than an acre. So they're only taking that out of production.
And it'll be their most, profitable acre and their entire farm I promise because they're not going to make that amount of money from whatever it is they're growing corn or or whatever. So it, it actually is a very good thing for them. And and as far as ranching goes, it doesn't, does not negatively affect the livestock. In fact, cattle will they'll follow the shadow around as the sun moves sky. They'll follow the shadow around, they're, they, you know how cattle are.
Yes, the shade of the tree just moving around just a little bit. Yeah. Correct. Now you mentioned there that it would be the most profitable acre for a farmer. How does that affect the farms that lease to these companies? And how does it affect the community as a whole?
affects the farm it's a positive effect. One, they, there's a the revenue stream, the passive revenue stream that comes from having a wind turbine on your property. And, but then if you're a farmer what, keep in mind, the turbines are out in a field, they're not next to the road. And so there's an access road that goes out to the turbine and the farmer has key, a farmer can use that access road.
So during harvest that access road can come in very handy with their equipment as they're harvesting and putting them, putting the grain or whatever it is in trucks and getting it out of there. They oftentimes use those those access roads. So it actually is a very convenient thing for them. And then as far as the community goes Well, let me just say this. Rural America is hurting and has been for years.
And we've all seen, schools consolidating and such because their tax base has moved away, moved to the city or something like that. And so you see school districts that are consolidating and because they just can't do it anymore. They don't have the tax base to do it. And that's one of the great things about wind farms and solar farms is it's. It's very much saving rural America. I have superintendents of schools in Roscoe, Texas tell me that they were in discussions.
with the neighboring school system about doing that very thing, consolidating. And when wind farms came in and it just, it changed everything that, that because every taxing entity in the county will get their piece of the pie and schools are part of that. And because the wind turbines or wind farms in that area, They, not only did they not have to consolidate, but they were able to build new buildings and hire new teachers and new science labs. And, it just changed everything in their world.
And the same thing happens with, again, any taxing entity. If there's a hospital district or the ambulance service or fire district, all of those entities that are taxing entities, they'll get their, their automatically get their piece of that tax revenue pie. And then on top of that, it is very common for wind wind companies to make sizable contributions to a fire department or a school or a hospital or something like that. And and you see those gifts in newspapers all the time.
How this wind farm paid for an ambulance or something like that. And it just, or paid for new equipment with the fire department. And so it's, it is a tremendous boost for that particular area.
locally about, I guess about a year ago, they announced a new theme park going in about an hour from me. And to get that up and going, they're making a huge investment in that theme park. The city is doing a TIF, because they've got to improve some infrastructure, the community does, so that this theme park can thrive.
There's some ways to do that and we don't want to get in deep part of that but what I'm asking is the community is there some cost the community's got to come up with or is this all funded by the energy company?
No, the community doesn't have to come up with anything. And the same can be said for the landowners. They don't have to come up and buy anything or invest in the project. The wind farm company will come in, develop the project. Everything is coming out of their pockets. not the landowner, not the local community. And not occasionally, and every state is different. They handle things different.
Like you said, we don't want to get into it, but sometimes they're some projects have had a tax abatements or something, which a community, an area will use something like that to entice an outside business to come in and bring the business, Into an area for the revenue and for the jobs and whatever. And what that means is for a certain amount of time there, the taxes would be reduced or something for up in the first part of it. And then after a while everything gets to where it should be.
And with that just going on that just a little bit does a wind farm coming into a community bring any jobs with it or is it mainly through the lease payments to the farmers and property values?
it does bring some jobs, especially during construction, when it's under construction, it looks like an anthill. There's a lot of activity and the wind companies generally try to use as much local talent as possible. There's no reason to bring in welders and bring in electricians and bring in road people because every area has those guys and girls, in place already. And so most wind companies will try to use as much local talent as possible.
A lot of times the county will require a certain amount of local talent during that construction time. But then once a project is built there, there's a staff there, the operations and maintenance facility, there'll be a team of people that maintain the turbines. And there's those operations and maintenance guys and they can be local people. In fact, there are a lot of colleges that have programs that train people to be wind turbine technicians.
And that way they, someone locally can go and get certified to do that. And, some, then it's a local person that has that permanent job. And then at the same time, there are people that aren't local. Let's say you use a, a turbine from X company. X company for the first couple of years may provide some staff there to make sure, because they're warranting the equipments, they want to make sure everything is done just and so they'll come in from outside,
Oh, okay. Yeah,
to use as much local talent as possible.
When we're talking about the farmers getting some income from that how much on average can a farmer earn from leasing land to a renewable energy project, and how long does that project last?
That, the answer to your first question is near impossible to answer. Every area is different, every company is different, every project is different and honestly what the value of an acre in one part of the, and you're in Oklahoma, one, that may be, that will be a different price than say up in Illinois or something like that. And so the payments to the landowners have to be appropriate for its particular location. And so I, there's really no way to answer. answer that first question.
I will say this if we're talking solar, because you know with a wind turbine you're talking one turbine out in the field. With solar, it pretty much occupies the field. And so everything that, or the what companies pay the landowners for solar, it has to be replacement income because that can no longer be farmed. Whereas for a wind turbine, a wind farm, it's not replacement. It's on top of their farming operation. And so it's, the two have to be handled completely.
Um, wind, Wind farms and solar farms you asked about the length of time, it, they can be 20, 30, 40 years or longer, again, every area is different. Some places they don't want it to go very long or as long as other places. But you have to realize that infrastructure has to stay in place because the wind company has to, they're getting investors to pay for the project and they have to, it's got to be there a while in order to pay for itself and for them to make money and such.
On the wind turbines, depending on the length of the lease, what's the lifetime of a wind turbine that gets put in?
And that's a good question. It's a young industry and it is growing by leaps and bounds. The technology, just in the 18 years I've been involved, the technology has changed dramatically. And and so there is a life span on them. The warranty on them could be as much as 20 years or so. And so you know they'll last that long. They're designed to last that long and the operations and maintenance folks will do everything they can to prolong that.
But let's be honest, 18 years ago we were talking one megawatt turbines. Today we're talking five and six megawatt turbines. If I were a landowner and I had a turbine on me, I'd want them to come and rip that dude out and put a new one in because I'll make more money. I mean, it's, so it's not so much the life expectancy, it's what is technology going to do in the next decade or two decades.
and we have that conversation a lot on the podcast about virtual fencing. The technology is fairly new on that, but it's exciting times because just in a few years the price is going to come down on it and we're going to be able to do some cool things with virtual fencing, which I'm excited about. So yeah, with energy, the technology there is moving at a rapid pace.
It is.
Now, when we talk about a wind farm in northeast Oklahoma, And I think you alluded to this a little bit earlier, but where's that energy going?
To the lights and your, your ovens and no, it it, it gets injected into whatever grid is there, whether it's And there are a number of grids in the United States, the ERCOT and MISO and, PJM and a whole bunch of other ones. And it gets injected into those grids and then it's like water or natural gas pipeline. It will flow the path, it'll go the path of least resistance. And so wherever power is being drawn from that grid, that's the direction those electrons are going to go.
Now, it may be sold to someone in another part of the country, the electricity, but it's, those electrons go where power is. where do the wires go and where the power's being taken off of the grid. And, I get asked pretty regularly about that question. Where does it go? And will some of the power, will it stay local or is it being shipped off somewhere else or whatever? Sometimes it can stay local. It all depends on what's connected into that grid.
But even if every bit of it goes somewhere else, That's really not a bad thing. Doesn't that make it an export? An export means you're bringing dollars from over there to this area here. So that's actually a good thing if that happens to be the case. And so it's, that's a question that gets asked and people were like I don't want my, if we're generating electricity, I don't want it to go somewhere else. And it's you don't have, handle your corn that way.
Or any, you grab, it's, that makes it an export, which makes it a very good thing.
I make more money when my livestock leave my farm than, when they're hanging out here, so yes. Yeah, and you mentioned this a little bit earlier about solar farms they reduce, there's some land use restrictions, and I think you'd said for the wind turbines, not really so much, but what land use restrictions happen for either of them?
With with a wind farm, there's not a whole lot of restriction. Whatever you were doing on your property. Before, you'll still be able to do it after a wind turbine is there, unless you're doing something illegal or whatever. I don't know. But generally speaking, whatever you were doing, you'll, you're probably still going to be able to do it. Including hunting whatever. It's, most wind companies, they don't care if you hunt, go get that big buck. Go for it.
Now during construction, that's a separate matter. Nobody wants anyone to get hurt and that's the big thing. But really whatever you were doing on your property before you probably be able to do it afterwards. Solar is a different matter. It occupies the property. It'll be fenced whereas wind farms are not fenced. And so the solar that field is I'm, you're restricted.
You can't even go in there and now some and they've been experimenting with different things around the world, of what to plant under them, so that, erosion doesn't happen, and, what CROP would be good under there, if you want to call it CROP, it's just cover, ground cover. But at the same time, once you plant something, how do you maintain that? Do you need to send folks in with weed eaters and, once a quarter or something, clean it up? Or a lot of places have been trying sheep.
You just put sheep in there and let them keep it clean. Now you wouldn't want to put goats in there. That, would destroy
if they're resting on top of the yeah,
exactly, exactly. But yeah, there, you could, The a solar field is you're restricted from using it. With the exception, perhaps of grazing sheep in there.
Oh yes, yeah. And I see a lot of benefit to grazing sheep with solar panels, but to be honest, I know there's solar, a couple little installations I've drove by that they put them so low to the ground, you can't graze anything under them.
And I think that's part of the reason why they are elevating them is because if they're low to the ground, not only can some livestock not get under there, but nothing will grow under there and you're creating this erosion problem. And Most of the time, the ones that I've seen anyway they're above the ground so that there's some sunshine that gets in there and that also allows for critters to get in there
Oh yeah.
and yeah. Um, but the downside to that, if they're low to the ground. They're less likely to be seen, and if they're up in the air, then you can see them as you're driving by, and so there's a give and take there, but I think for the most part, people would prefer a little bit of elevation there so that it's, because farmers, even though they're not farming it at that time, they still don't want erosion,
Oh,
that'll tear up their it'll just destroy the area, and so that's that's why they do that.
Especially in Regenerative Ag we all the time talk about ground cover. Gotta have something protecting the earth or we're going to have erosion, soil temperature is going to be way too high. It's going to affect your underground livestock. Yeah. Now when installation takes place, what are some environmental concerns? The construction, putting it in, is it any different than any other construction? Anything that, because we hear it's bad for the environment, it's bad for whatever.
Is there any concerns there beyond any other construction?
It's, it is a big construction site. And with wind turbines, there's a lot of concrete that goes into those foundations and so there's water use at that time. And it's a construction site. It's a mess. It always will be. When you built your house, it was a mess. Just construction sites are that way. But it is a mess, but it's all cleaned up and reseeded and it becomes just pretty much the way it was. Only there's a turbine there now.
And but as far as environmental wildlife, it's not a concern for wildlife. You hear about birds. They really, and the industry has been very proactive in trying to deal with bird strikes and they have eliminated bird strikes, tremendously.
The, back in the old days, long time ago, when in the early days of the wind industry, the turbines were much smaller, they were on these a tripod type tower that had cross members in there, and the blades would spin real fast, and what happened back then, and this is where wind farms got a bad rap for, bird strikes, is birds would roost in there on those cross members of the
Oh, yeah.
just like an airplane, when the wind is blowing this way, an airplane, when they're landing or taking off, they'll fly into the wind so they can accomplish what they're needing to do at a slower, a lower ground speed. What would happen is they would as they were coming in, they would and, and another thing is that turbines back then were passive rather than active. Like today, the turbines are out facing into the wind, so the wind hits the blades before it hits the tower.
Back then, they were just the small rotors were on the down downstream side of the tower, at which would mean the birds would be flying in. to land where they're roosting and they would hit those blades or the blades would hit them and it would strike them.
So when the turbines were redesigned and the towers now are giant tubes and they're much taller and the blades are much longer so the rpms we're talking a dozen rpms with these the bigger turbines and so just some of these very basic changes in the design of the turbines eliminated most of the bird strikes. Now there still are some bird strikes that happen and so they work hard to try to deter certain birds from being in the area.
Most birds can see them, they see them there and they just avoid them and, but we don't want any of the birds to get to, to get killed by them. But the fact of the matter is Windows in houses kill more birds than turbines do. Cars kill more birds than turbines do, and house cats kill more birds than turbines do. And so if you were to look at wind turbines and or if you were to look at the things that kill birds, wind turbines are way down on the
Oh, yeah. And I know with the wind farm installations that's near me, and I say near me, within an hour, those blades are moving so slow, the RPMs are so low on that, it just amazes me how slow they move now. And that brings me to a question just on wind speed. At what wind speed does the turbine start working?
Again, every turbine is different. It's like your car. Some cars drive faster. It can go faster than others. But And then another thing to keep in mind, the wind speed that you're, the wind that you're feeling when you're standing on the ground is vastly different than what it is up at the hub height. And it could be 20, 30 miles an hour or whatever. And I don't even want to say a number because it's, It'll be close for one and it'll be wrong tomorrow.
And so, but there is a cut in speed and there's also a cut out speed. If the wind gets too fast, they'll, it'll cut out to, to protect the turbine.
Oh, yes. Yeah. And with our tornadoes in the area those high speeds can be hit sometimes. And that brings up a question that locally is important to me. How do they fare in a tornado?
There was a tornado that went through it in Iowa just recently and took out two or three, several turbines. And I think, I'm not, don't hold me to this, but I think that was the first time here in the United States that a tornado, uh, was a direct hit on a turbine.
And I think I saw a video of that. And when that happens, I'm assuming there's safeguards in place and that, that particular turbine is automatically taken offline and the others can continue to produce. Is that a correct assumption?
And they do some things as a storm is approaching so that the turbines are less likely to damage themselves because of the high winds.
Oh, okay.
And now if something is struck, and I want you to notice, go back and look at the video from Iowa, those that were struck. What happened, what did those turbines do? Those nacelles, they fell straight to the ground. They're very heavy. The blades fell straight to the It's not, even though those blades are designed to catch the wind, They weigh so much, they go straight to the ground. And the the idea of, like in the movie Twister or whatever, things flying through the air.
Now I've seen cattle feeders flying through I used to work for a TV station, and I was a photographer, and so I actually did some tornado chasing. And I've seen a cattle feeder just flying through the air. And those are big and heavy but they're also hollow. And but those turbines that you saw on the video in the strike, the tornadoes in Iowa, those things fell straight to the ground.
Very good. We hope we don't have to experience a tornado and those people that's had to suffer from them. Our thoughts and prayers go to them and things are getting better. Changing gears just a little bit, let's go back to the farmer and him being approached by energy company. What's some things that should that farmer be aware of? And on that negotiation and going through that.
First of all, listen. the person that is presenting the information to them. Obviously they have a vested interest. They want to walk away at least at the end of the negotiations with an agreement, but at the same time, they also want to get all those answers to the questions that the landowners have. And so listen to what they have to say. And, put some gray matter into it. I'd have to say, don't listen so much to what the internet is saying.
And I will say this, when I started this, when I started doing this 18 years ago rural, the people in rural America really wanted, they liked it. They were farmers, they were ranchers or whatever, and they liked the idea of this other revenue stream. Since then renewable energy has been politicized, and that's where you get the left versus right, and generally speaking, your landowners are right leaning, because, conservative America and and renewable energy happens to be left leaning.
I really hate that because it shouldn't be political at all. We need to have strong energy policy. That's the bottom line. And and so they, they need to not listen, don't get into the politics of it. Make a good decision for the farm, for the ranch, for whatever. And ask the right questions, and the industry is not real young anymore and so states have certain requirements that have to be in those agreements, like reclamation and so on.
Those were questions that used to, landowner used to really need to drill in on. A lot of it is already handled because the, at a state level or at a county level, there are some required things that have to be in, in those agreements. But the main thing is listen. Listen, and, you know, put, put, put your brain to it and see if it works good for your operation.
on those lease discussions, do they typically include, if the decommissioning process of a wind turbine in those agreements?
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And and all the agreements are different. Within a project, they should be the same, but every project is different. Every area is different. But yeah, it's, and another thing is years ago, sometimes people would, they would just negotiate their own agreement. Today, there's sizable percentage of people that are being approached that will take it to an attorney Oh, make sure everything is being handled.
One other question on the leasing part of it. You lease your land and they come in and do this work. At some point in the future, you decide to sell that land. How does that affect that process?
Just like any other lease you might have on your property. If you have a tenant farmer that farms your property, That lease agreement with that farmer goes with the surface. So if you sold your property to Someone else that farmer that you have farming that he's still going to farm it or he or she for as long as that agreement is in place and so It's just like that. It follows real estate law for that particular state
Oh, yeah. Dennis, this has been a great discussion. I'm learning lots, which is always good. I need to learn more. But I'd like to transition to some questions we received from the Grazing Grass Community.
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I put out in the community, said we're going to have you on here, what's some questions. you would like have answered. I know some of these questions will be questions that we may have already covered, but we'll go ahead and go over them again. So our first question from our community is from Bob, and his question was, How many acres go out of production for every 100 windmills?
Generally, again, during construction, a wind turbine occupies about an acre. That includes the crane pad and so on. Once it's operational the, even with the road going out to the, the small lane going out to the turbine would be less than an acre, but let's just say an acre, just for simple math. If there's a hundred turbines, there'll be a hundred acres that are taken out of production.
And a hundred turbines with these larger turbines, that's gonna cover a lot of property, a lot of square miles to get a hundred turbines in.
Oh yes, on the turbines, how close can they be put together, or is there an average, if we talk about an orchard, we're talking about we want trees spaced every so often. How is that planned out?
It it's, there's a, mathematics goes into it. The bigger the turbine, the further they have to be apart. The longer the blades, the further they have to be
Oh yeah.
And here's the reason why when wind goes through a wind turbine, the turbine is spinning. It it disrupts the wind. Okay, and so you've got to give it some space for that wind to let's just say to reorganize itself before it hits the next turbine. And so you've got to, you've got to spread them out and the bigger the turbine, the further apart they have to be have to be. And so that's, there's not an easy answer for that.
Generally it's in like a formula like, and different companies do it differently. It might be. So many rotor diameters, you've got the rotor that the, the three blades and it might be that they might put their turbines, 10 rotor diameters apart or some number, whatever their number is. And sometime, other companies may do it by tip height, so many tip heights apart. Everyone has their own formula. But the bottom line is the bigger the turbine, the further apart they, they need to be.
We have a couple individuals ask very similar questions, so I'm going to put them together, but Cody says do wind farms affect weather patterns in an area, while Jake points to a Harvard study from 2020 that found wind turbines will cause more warming in Minnesota than emissions reductions would avert. What's your thoughts on that?
Two thoughts on it. There are very few things that we as human beings on a small scale will affect weather patterns. The, on a larger scale, if you build a reservoir, you build a dam and you back up water and you have a reservoir, it's going to change the weather patterns. As cities grow and they have all of the concrete in the city and it heats things up, that can change the weather patterns. The wind turbines are tall and they are moving things. I don't know.
I honestly don't know whether they actually can change the direction of the clouds or weather patterns or whatever. I honestly don't know that, but I will say this. Several universities, I think University of Illinois and maybe Iowa and Michigan also but they did studies on the effect of wind turbines on CROP yields. And they were interesting studies, but they all came up with a similar answers.
And that is depending on the CROP, if it's a kind of a grass based CROP, like wheat or something like that, there's no effect whatsoever. But on some other ones like corn and soybean and whatever there was a marginal improvement and the yield of those fields that have a turbine. And they do make a point to say it's marginal, and I don't know the science behind why but they did come to the same conclusions.
Very good. The our next question, Tyler is changing gears just a little bit. He's wondering about what wind energy options look like for farm home generation.
I don't know a whole lot about the residential size. I think if it makes good financial sense for you, um, then go for it. I like the idea, but I don't really, I can't really answer that. That's not my,
that's not your expertise, yes. Yeah. Glenn is wondering, do wind farms affect groundwater?
Not that I am aware of. They're, like I say the water that, that is used is all up front. Unlike something that is where a steam turbine is used, they use a lot of water continuously. Wind is not that way. The ground water is well below the turbines and their foundations. And so I don't believe so. But certainly worth I'm sure some university will be studying that if they haven't already. Um, I'm sure that will be the
case, yes. I have a couple more questions that's very similar to each other. Chris is wondering about the dangers of blade ice to livestock. And Miles says he's heard of ice falling from blades that is dangerous for livestock.
when yes, as they're moving through the air and it's just like on an airplane, ice can build up if the weather conditions are just right. There have been some efforts to try, like on an airplane, try to keep that from building up. And yeah, I know industry wide they're trying to address that, but the reality of it is if there's a cold weather event and when it starts to thaw, pieces of the ice are going to come off. And so I, honestly, I, it only makes sense.
Don't go get near one, have your cattle in another field or something or whatever. That just makes good sense to do that. Reduce the risk to your operation and your health. But yeah, that, that is a thing. But how severe it is there's some ownership of the people that live there as well.
Oh yeah. Yeah. Teddy asks, what are the long term lease agreements for replacement and removal or returning the land to the original state?
And like I say, every agreement I've ever seen, and I've worked for a bunch of different companies because I've done contract work working for companies, and they all have that restoration. That's what it's And they all have restoration language and guidelines of what needs to be done how far down to remove things. What what to, re seeding and timelines and all of that. It's it's addressed. It's a very good question and that language has to be in, in those agreements.
Because there, there have been some unsavory things happen in the past, either here in the U. S. Or abroad, and that, they address those today, which is why a wind agreement is, I don't know, 40, 50 pages long. It is not a simple document because they're addressing all of those things that people want to know about.
Yeah, very good. Anna says, how do wind turbines affect long term health in livestock grazed under and around them?
Long term health and livestock has I have seen cattle follow the shadow around the, there, it doesn't bother livestock at all. Um, I've seen goats up on the pad mount transformer. I've seen deer all around the base of a turbine. And it's In fact, some areas I was working on a project in Pennsylvania and they, the landowner required that they use that to, to seed the area after construction.
They have what they call Pennsylvania mix, which I'm not sure what I'll grasses and things that are in there, but it also includes clover and deer love clover. And so every one of those turbines actually became a food plot for deer. And you know it, and it was actually bringing them in. And so no, there was not a negative effect at all.
Yeah. Very good. Carl says, how much does it affect the value of your property as well as that of your neighbors?
Very good question. There have been multiple studies about that. Obviously, if there is a turbine or, anything creating a passive revenue stream, that will absolutely add value. Because it will if there is something generating a income. It goes with the surface. Unless there's some, the person selling it, they may reserve that, but they're really hurting themselves if they do something like that.
Is, but there have been studies that, interestingly enough multiple studies have come to the same conclusion that wind turbines have, either do not affect the value of the property at all, or it can even increase the value slightly, even in what's called the viewshed area. And what viewshed means is, you don't have any infrastructure on you, but you can see them. You can see turbine from there. And I'm a real estate agent myself.
And and sometimes it's hard to figure out why this is, but it is the truth. And it's it's a, It does have a positive effect. And I went into Indiana and visited with some real estate agents and appraisers and so on that were near a wind farm. They had been there for a decade and I said, don't tell me what you think I want to hear. Tell me what the truth is. How do, what's the value of this, these properties around this wind farm?
How does it compare to properties in another part of the county where they're not anywhere near that? And they all said exactly the same thing, including one lady that says, I don't like wind turbines, but it doesn't hurt the value of the property.
Interesting.
apologized. She said, I hate to tell you this, but it doesn't hurt.
Yeah, good little surprising answer or interesting answer I didn't anticipate there. Chase has a longer question so I'll read it. How many years does it take for one windmill to reach positive net energy production versus the energy and fossil fuels that are used? fuels it took to mine for minerals, produce parts, transport pieces, ground prep work, hole excavation, cement based pouring, installation and maintenance of one unit.
Not to mention the energy required to install power lines and a substation to collect and ship energy produced. Basically, he sums it up, have they done a life cycle analysis of the energy produced by turbines versus the energy it took to produce and install and maintain them.
Yes, there have been studies done. I don't know the results of let me give you just the real practical result. There have been studies by the turbine manufacturers and the transmission pole manufacturers and all the people that create the different components and aspects of a wind farm and they have figured out what it costs or what they need to get and when they sell those in order to recover those costs that he just mentioned.
And then the wind companies have to buy those and then install those in. So woven into the buying and selling of the components and installing them. It's already done. And the manufacturers are making money. The turbine the wind companies are making money. The landowners are making money. The electric companies are making money. And has it been done? Absolutely. And the practical side of it is it's making everybody money. And so it must be making sense.
Yeah. Yeah. Skyler asks, what protections and guarantees are there against stray voltage?
Stray voltage is a, it's a real thing. It's or EMFs, electromagnetic fields is another thing. But I will tell you this. We as a culture are, we're very comfortable with electricity. We all know there are, there's stray voltage. We know there's electromagnetic fields. It's, it is a given. Yet we still invite it into our homes. We put those wires in our walls right next to our recliner, right next to our baby's crib. We're okay with it. And wind turbines that we're talking way out in the field.
And they're, I do know that under some transmission lines wind I've never done this, but I have been told that if you'll hold up a fluorescent light bulb under a transmission line, it'll turn on. Just you holding it in your hand. I've never done that. I've wanted to, I don't know. But I also know a rancher in the Texas panhandle. They built a new transmission line. It wasn't us, but they built a new transmission line and it happened to go over a water tank.
And all this cattle stopped using that water tank. And I think there was just enough stray voltage that they would get a little bit of a zap or something. They moved the water tank, everything, they also, the cattle started using it again. So it's a real thing. I don't know, I don't know that it's much of a danger because, We all use it and pull it in But as far as the safeguards, it's we do with the not the wind industry, but the Electrical engineering.
I mean there are things that we have to live by you know It has to be so many feet above the ground for overhead depending on the voltage or so many feet Below ground if you're burying it And so those are given. I'm not, again, I'm not an engineer. I don't know what those numbers are, but we have to live by those.
Yeah, makes sense to me. Aaron's got three questions for us. Are livestock producers compensated for the loss of grazing area where turbines and access roads are built? If so, how is that calculated?
Again, every agreement is different but I will say this. I've not seen one because the amount of grazing ground that is taken out is so minor compared to the rest of the farm, and they're making so much more money from that turbine. It's not even, To my knowledge, I've never seen one with it in there. And now I have their farming is different. There are CROP damages and things.
And so that's a little different, but as far as grazing cattle, it'd be worth asking the if they're being approached by somebody with a wind company, ask them, you know, see if they'll put it in there.
Yeah. Second question Aaron has, when acquiring land for wind farms, what are the landowner's biggest concerns?
Oh, that's good. Again, everybody is different. It all depends on what they've heard, what their neighbors have told them and so on. I will say this landowners, when you're talking rural land, especially if it's a legacy property, that's been in the family for a long time landowners look to that property. almost like a brother, a family member, and they want to do right by that piece of property.
And they take it very seriously and they want to make sure that it's good, not only for their pocket book, but, for their brother, that, that track, if that makes sense. And That's, But that, most of the questions that we've talked about, everyone has these and other ones that, and they're asking really good ones here, and these are questions that I get asked quite a bit.
Oh, yeah. His third question, from a farmer's perspective, a wind farm would be much more impactful on land use for crops what kind of impact would a wind farm or wind turbine have on pasture ground or to a livestock operation? Besides the loss of pasture, is there any other impacts?
Again, it's the impact of a wind turbine, that loss of acreage, that take, acres taken out of production is so minor. It's negligible, whether you're talking farming or grazing or whatever. It's the house that you build out on that farm takes up way more space than that turbine will.
Very good. Dennis our next two questions. are really pretty much the same so I'll combine them. Brent says, do these wind turbines generate magnetic fields and what impact does that have on livestock? And David asks, what types of electromagnetic radiation do they emit?
And as I mentioned, just a few minutes ago, anytime there's electricity going down a wire, it will create a EMF electromagnetic field and that's just now wire without electricity going down, it doesn't have an EMF, but if there are electrons going down it, it does. And it's again, we are so comfortable with that.
We bring it into our homes and I, I got a meter to walk around And I stood under transmission lines and took some readings and then I went into the house and got next to plugs and light switches where there was power going through there. And it is it, you'd be surprised, I'll just put it this way, what's actually happening inside our homes. And so it's, it is a real thing, but then you have the question, does that actually hurt us?
And you can't, I have not been able to come up with a definitive answer as to whether those EMFs actually harm you.
Oh
I I don't know.
My, my grandma was very much about the benefits of magnets. So she had A blanket or quill almost that had magnets all in it between her box springs and her mattress on her bed.
Huh. And maybe kept her healthy.
Maybe yeah. Let's see. Leah's got our next question, and I'm going to rephrase just a little bit on this question. But if a Energy company should go out of business for any reason. Who maintains and removes the structures at that point? And how long do you think the government subsidy of wind turbines will continue?
Let me handle the second one first. The The government's involvement in wind farms is, the wind companies do not get money from the government. Taxpayers do not pay into, and those dollars end up in wind companies pockets. It is simply a tax credit. With wind, it's a production tax credit. With solar, it's an investment tax credit. And they're phasing those out anyway.
But And honestly, in Dennis's opinion, every form every form of energy needs to have be supported and have incentive from the federal government. You take all industrialized countries, they're, all forms of energy are either incentivized or owned outright by the government. And so why would wind be any different? And so it, it just makes sense to me. I want, we're talking the United States here. I want the United States to have very strong energy policy.
and I lived through the oil embargo and different things and that's not fun. And we need to make sure that we have very strong energy policies. And I'm sorry, what was the first part of that question?
The first part, if a company goes out of business, who's going to maintain or remove those structures?
And that has happened. A wind company has gone out of business and, without going into a lot of detail there, I will say this. It was more of an investment company than a wind company, but they owned these things. They made some other investments that were not related to wind and they went out of business. But as when something, just like when something is foreclosed on. the banks end up owning those. Banks don't want to own real estate. They don't want to own things.
And so they, they sold that for cents on a dollar. Other companies bought them on the cheap. And so they got good deals. And to my knowledge, and I did check into it. I don't think anyone missed a single payment, not even late at all. It just, because. You have to look at it from the point of view. Those are great assets. Somebody's going to want to scoop those up at cents on the dollar. And they do.
And so it's not like it's just going to sit there and no one operates it and it's just sitting there out in the field. That's just not how it works with our our economy.
Oh yeah. Yeah. Alec. Has a question for us. Uh, when will they come back and fix all the fence they tore out and patched in? I'm assuming that's probably comes back to that agreement.
Yeah, it does. And Wind companies are not fence companies, just like they're not road companies. They try to build as few roads as possible and they try to tear up as few fences as possible and they'll hire local fence people to come and do all the repair work. That's an individual project. And like you say, it should be addressed in that agreement. And and it all depends on, it's really funny. It depends on where in the country you are.
You go to some parts of the country and it's all about fences and gates. By golly, I want, cattle guards and all of that. You go to another part of the country and they don't care about fences and gates. They want to know about erosion and water runoff. And it's It just depends on where you are. But to, to that person's question, I'm sorry that's happening, but she needs to be talking to a representative with that company and get that
Oh, yeah. Yeah. I appreciate the grazing grass community providing some questions for us to go through and we appreciate you answering that for them.
Have good Too.
to wind down just a little bit, What advice do you have to landowners considering leasing land to solar or wind projects?
Now I, this is what I do for a living. And so my advice would be make the agreement as good as it can be for you. and then jump at it because it, it is a passive revenue stream for 40, 50 years. Whether we're talking wind or solar either way I've talked to some landowners that I was working on a solar project and, some people go, Oh, I can't farm the property. And I don't want to have any part of that. There was someone that boy, they jumped at it because they were retirement age.
And they were like, hey, I can continue to get the money that I would have made had I been farming it. And, it'll not, it'll outlast me and my kids will end up getting that revenue stream. Plus, at the end of the life of the project, because it hasn't been farmed for 40 or 50 years. That ground is so healthy. And talk about keeping the, setting your property up so it stays in the family.
Because that's another thing that I see a lot is you have farmers, they grew up out there, but their kids have gone off to college and now they're living in a city and they don't want to go out there and farm the ground. And so now the poor landowner's faced with. Gosh, I have to sell granddad's property now. I don't want to do that. And that having a Passive revenue stream is a great way to keep that property
Oh, yeah. Yeah. And Dennis, lastly, where can others find out more about you?
Oh I have a well a couple of things CROP america. com is a great resource that you can go to and learn all sorts of things about renewable energy. I do videos myself. It's I'm, windfarmguy. com is my website. I also have a YouTube channel and so those would be the two places I would send folks is CROPamerica. com and windfarmguy. com.
And we'll put those links in our show notes as well. Dennis, really appreciate you coming on, answering our questions expanding our knowledge on renewable energy.
Happy to be here. Thanks for the invitation.
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