Banner County Wind Energy Association secretary Karen Bahnsen generated a lot of excitement as she electrified the crowd of about 100 assembled at WNCC in Scottsbluff on July 28 for a wind energy meeting.

She told how a 500 tower wind farm could bring in $21.2 million to the local economy over 20 years.

Bahnsen said, “We need a smart grid and transmission lines to make it happen.”

A smart grid system can accept electric power input from several sources - coal power plant, solar, wind generated, hydroelectric, etc. - and balance them into a smooth, continuous blend of electric supply.

And transmission lines are necessary to get the electricity to the user.

She said the BCWEA logged 13,000 miles in lobbying to get LB 1048 passed. She said the organization has met every Wednesday night for several years to develop and support a plan of action to get wind energy development for Banner County.

Bahnsen said about 110,000 acres in Banner County are leased or subject to some wind energy agreement. She pointed out that there are also 8,000 acres of school lands in the county that could be leased for wind development.

She presented a map of wind strength in Nebraska that showed Banner County to be one of the richest areas in the state in wind resources.

Bahnsen said, “We have 700 square miles and about 700 people in the county.”

State Senator John Harms told how LB 1048 made wind energy development for export of electricity now possible.

Harms said LB1048 also solved some eminent domain problems that were a carryover from early days of public power legislation.

LB 1048 also gives a longer life depreciation schedule, which makes the cash flow to local governments easier to manage.

Harms said, “This may bring some of the brain power back to the Panhandle and level the field between eastern and western Nebraska.

Gregory Christensen of the National Farmers Union spoke of the advantages of C-BED development, Under C-BED, interested local people put up a total of $9,000 each spread over three stages and end up owning the lion’s share of small wind farms of five or six turbines each. He said this type development brought in more money to the local economy.

Christensen said a carbon tax was necessary to stimulate wind energy development.

The audience threw some pointed questions to the assembled panel.

Q) Why is the buyback price paid for net power developed by small wind  turbines so erratic across the state?

A) There is a lot of interest in revisiting net metering regulations.

Q) Has there been a study on the effect of bringing private power into the public power picture of Nebraska?

A) None.

Q) Wouldn’t farmers in the Panhandle practicing till farming  be penalized by a carbon tax. No till does not work here.

A) Lots of things that work in the east don’t work in the west.

Q) Aren’t we 10 years behind in wind development because of Nebraska Public Power District policy?

One attendee said, “We are 20 years late on water, 10 years late on wind . We can’t wait on Lincoln and Washington.”

Bahnsen reminded the group of something school teachers tell their young pupils, “Nobody gets their own way all the time.”

She quoted words spoken by Abraham Lincoln in a lecture given in 1860, “... As yet the wind is an untamed, and unharnessed force; and quite possibly one of the greatest discoveries hereafter to be made, will be the taming and harnessing of it.”

Kimball County was represented at the meeting by Rod Horton (Kimball-Banner County Chamber of Commerce director), Bob Jesser, Carol Dunne-Benson, and Don Sharp (Observer.)