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What benefit does a wind farm have for me if I don’t have them on my land?

A wind farm generates substantial value for a local community, including:

• Revenues to Towns: Property taxes or payments in lieu of taxes.
• Revenues to Farming and Ranching Landowners: Providing significant and stable revenues to local farmers and ranchers.
• Short Term Construction Benefits: Taken as an example, the construction of 50 wind turbines will produce roughly 60 full and part time jobs and create a significant demand for local construction materials and services. It is UPC’s policy to subcontract locally for construction to the greatest extent possible.
• Long Term Operations and Maintenance: Operation and maintenance of 50 wind turbines will produce approximately 4-6 long term service jobs. It is UPC’s policy to hire and train locally to the greatest extent possible.
• Attraction of Industry: Due to UPC’s large turbine orders, Vestas, a major turbine manufacturer, constructed a turbine manufacturing facility near UPC projects.
• Electricity Supply: The worlds’ energy demand continues to increase.
• Wind provides a way to meet a significant portion of this increase without the drawbacks of other types of power generation:
• Coal plants produce significant amounts of pollutants including carbon dioxide (greenhouse gas), SO2 (acid rain), NOx (acid rain and smog), particulate matter (asthma and other air pollution related illnesses), carbon monoxide, and mercury (contamination of fish and water supplies).
• Nuclear plants are difficult to site, are at risk of accidents and attack, and produce long-lasting radioactive waste that is difficult and risky to dispose of.
• Natural gas-fired plants, while cleaner than coal and nuclear, are often not cost competitive due to large and sudden fuel price increases.
• Large-scale hydroelectric projects have significant human and natural environmental impacts from the flooding of large areas of land.