New Law Passed to Advance Community Energy Projects
Next Generation Energy Act Helps MN Farmers and Small Businesses Build Renewable Energy Projects
St. Paul, MN – (5/25/07) Today Governor Tim Pawlenty signed the Next Generation Energy Act (SF145), which includes critical provisions that will help rural communities build wind farms, biomass power plants and other renewable energy facilities.
NEW ENERGY: A fresh look at how the Midwest is creating a green energy economy
Windustry has partnered with Twin Cities Public Television and Erika Johnson to tell the story of how wind, biofuels, and other renewable energy technologies are contributing to the region’s energy security, economic sustainability, and integrity of our natural resources.
NEW ENERGY premiered on Sunday, January 7, 2007 on MN TPT Channel 17, and since then it has appeared on:
"Major US Utility Facilitates Citizen Wind Power," Windpower Monthly, May 2006, Vol. 22, No. 5, pp. 29-30. "In an American twist to the European model of community scale wind power development, huge Midwest utility Xcel Energy is facilitating the birth of a broad popular movement in local ownership of small scale wind projects." Windustry executive director Lisa Daniels contributed to this article on the impact of C-BED (Community-Based Energy Development) on wind energy projects in Minnesota.
Promising New Crop, by Jill K. Cliburn, Rural Electric, November 2004. A group of 46 farmers in south-central Minnesota hope wind turbines will improve the productivity of their fields; a G&T co-op will buy all 100 megawatts. Rural Electric is the magazine of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association.
"Getting Landowners through the First Steps: Land use decisions now have repercussions that stretch decades into the future" by William Opalka, North American WINDPOWER, Volume 2, Number 3, April 2005.
by Kindra Gordon
Looking for another crop to harvest? Consider the wind. Wind turbines are compatible with raising crops, forages and livestock, says Lisa Daniels, director of Windustry, a Minnesota-based organization devoted to educating landowners about wind energy. They take less than 2% of the land out of production, and it's an additional source of revenue. With wind energy potential pegged at 10,777 billion
Minnesota Public Radio, has a number of online articles and resources about Wind and other Renewable Energy sources
By Mary Hoff
Photography by Michael Petersen
