{"id":20958,"date":"2017-03-02T11:34:59","date_gmt":"2017-03-02T17:34:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=20958"},"modified":"2017-03-02T11:34:59","modified_gmt":"2017-03-02T17:34:59","slug":"moratorium-on-sandhills-wind-energy-projects-proposed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=20958","title":{"rendered":"Moratorium on Sandhills wind energy projects proposed"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Natural Resources Committee heard testimony March 1 on a bill that would place a two-year moratorium on wind energy development in the Nebraska Sandhills.

\"Sen.
Sen. Tom Brewer<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/p>\n

LB504, introduced by Sen. Tom Brewer of Gordon, would create a task force to study and make recommendations to the Legislature regarding the siting of wind energy projects in the Sandhills, a sand dune formation in north-central Nebraska that covers approximately 19,000 square miles. The moratorium on industrial development of wind energy projects and the placement of turbines in the region would begin Jan. 1, 2018.<\/p>\n

Brewer said the bill is neither for nor against wind energy development. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe reason I introduced this bill is to try and do something to heal the communities of my district,\u201d he said. \u201cCommercial wind energy development in the Sandhills is tearing the communities apart.\u201d <\/p>\n

Brewer said the issue is too complex and its effects too far-reaching to be left to individual counties to address. The bill is intended to pause development and create a nonpartisan venue through which all voices on each side of the debate can be heard, he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis rush to build has made the loudest voices in this argument those that have the deepest pockets,\u201d Brewer said. \u201cI think ordinary Nebraskans are not being heard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wayne Eatinger, a Cherry County resident, testified in support of the bill. He said the moratorium and task force would help ease the bitterness among the county\u2019s residents over wind energy development, including a proposed 30-turbine wind farm near Kilgore.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf this wind development is the thing to do, it\u2019ll be the thing to do a couple of years from now.\u201d Eatinger said. \u201cThe Sandhills deserve special accordance and special consideration.\u201d<\/p>\n

George Cunningham, conservation chair of the Nebraska chapter of the Sierra Club, also testified in support of the bill. He said the Sierra Club supports the development of wind energy, as long as it is properly sited. The Sandhills is one of the largest grass-stabilized dune regions in the world, Cunningham said, with abundant surface water and groundwater and high wildlife diversity. Building industrial infrastructure such as energy facilities and transmission lines in the region would be inappropriate, he said.<\/p>\n

Cunningham said Nebraska\u2019s wind energy needs can be met by placing wind farms on existing converted lands, including approximately 16 million acres that have been converted to row crop agriculture.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe see no need to place energy development facilities on native grasslands, river bluff lands or near wetland complexes,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Testifying in opposition to the bill was Bree DeNaeyer, a Cherry County landowner and a member of Cherry County Wind, a group of landowners working to develop wind energy projects on their land. Wind energy development in the area is a contentious issue, DeNaeyer said, but the county zoning board already has in place some of the strictest wind energy regulations in the country. <\/p>\n

\u201cOur local zoning, planning and commissioner boards \u2014 in Cherry County specifically \u2014 have had the pulse on and are hearing what is best for our area and are actively enacting regulations to reflect the will of our local citizens,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

DeNaeyer said the moratorium would appease only one side of the debate and would penalize landowners who have voluntarily agreed to allow wind energy systems to be built on their land. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe chaotic environment pitting neighbor versus neighbor is very accurate, but I don\u2019t believe it\u2019s something that can be legislated against,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to be mollified by state laws or a two-year ban \u2014 it simply would kick the can down the road.\u201d <\/p>\n

Tom Budler, president of BHE Wind, also testified in opposition to the bill. He said BHE completed the 400-megawatt Grande Prairie Wind Farm in Holt County last year, a project that will generate approximately $2.5 million in landowner lease payments and an additional $2 million in new property tax revenue annually. He said Omaha Public Power District has issued a request for proposal for another 450 megawatts of renewable energy.<\/p>\n

\u201cA two-year moratorium on any wind development in the Sandhills could definitely hamper Omaha Public Power District\u2019s efforts to deliver low-cost, renewable energy to its ratepayers and our ability to further invest in the state,\u201d Budler said. \u201cMore generally, it would send the message that Nebraska is not open for the business of wind development and would encourage us and other likely developers to focus our financial resources in other states.\u201d<\/p>\n

The committee took no immediate action on the bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Natural Resources Committee heard testimony March 1 on a bill that would place a two-year moratorium on wind energy development in the Nebraska Sandhills.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[15],"tags":[174],"class_list":["post-20958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-natural-resources","tag-sen-tom-brewer"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20958"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20958\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20960,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20958\/revisions\/20960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}