"Our primary goal is to assist communities and farmers in securing the local economic development and environmental benefits attached to renewable energy production facilities owned by organizations and ordinary people rooted in the local community. We support a transition to a sustainable energy economy based on clean renewable resources."

- Dan Juhl, Community Wind Development Group, LLC

News is pouring in about more and more wind farms being built in the United States.  There's a good reason for it:  wind power is extremely profitable.  A new generation of windmills has made capturing clean, cheap and limitless wind energy into a big, lucrative business. Wind energy is one of the fastest growing energy sources in the world. In 2005, new wind farms were the second-largest source of new power generation in the U.S., after new natural gas power plants.

But there's an untold story here that can have a huge impact on area farmers and small communities. It's the story of who really owns the wind, and who will profit from it.

The choice is simple: the money can go to big corporations and leave the region.  Or it can go to the farmers who actually own the wind rights and stay here to save family farms and benefit the local community.

All across America large corporate developers are knocking on farmhouse doors or calling neighborhood meetings and offering what amounts to a pittance for wind rights.  In general a wind developer---we call them windcatters---are offering long term contracts involving lease payments of $3-7,000 per year per wind turbine.  Many farmers, thinking their wind rights are worthless, are signing on.

But if the community or farm family takes the time to develop a wind farm itself, it can generate much more revenue, often resulting in a wind fall for the small town or even the saving of family farms.  In fact, if the community/farmer takes a ten-year note to finance its own wind project, for example, it can realize in the range of $25,000 per year per turbine.  Once the note is paid off, that can turn into more than $150,000 per year per turbine. 

There are hurdles: testing for wind, negotiating grid access, power purchase agreement and navigating permitting, including environmental requirements. But with the help of a few of us who are dedicated to family and community-owned wind farming, these stepscan be done independently.  It may take a little more time, but it is proven, do-able and extremely profitable.  The long-term advantages to the farmers and the community are enormous.

Exactly this is being done in southwestern Minnesota by farmer and wind power pioneer Dan Juhl.  A veteran of 30 years of grassroots wind farming, Juhl has helped develop more than $100 million worth of farmer- and community-owned commercial-scale wind farming, helping to save (countless) family farms while keeping millions of dollars in revenues in local communities rather than corporate balance sheets. 

Juhl has even produced a handbook for farmers and communities wanting to benefit fairly from this "cash crop in the sky."

In New York State there is abundant wind energy and grid access for farmer-owned wind power.  Corporate speculators have already moved in to grab up this precious resource. 

Farmers and communities approached to sell their wind rights should think at least twice about the true value of this new cash crop.  Before they sign away anything resembling the right to erect turbines on their property, they should investigate the realities of owning their own wind farms. 

It could mean the difference between keeping their farms and losing them.  It could also mean millions of new dollars staying in New York communities, where they belong.