A citizen’s group has kicked off a campaign aimed at heavily restricting wind turbines from being built in northwest Missouri’s Buchanan County.
Turbines have not gone up in Buchanan County, but some companies have shown interest.Anita Simon with the group ‘Friends of Buchanan County’ says a petition gathered asks County Commissioners to require a one-mile setback of wind power projects from property
“Because we believe that is a fair and reasonable distance to protect us from the ill effects from the wind turbines,” says Simon. “There’s many of those that I could list.”
Simon says the group is not against renewable energy.
“We don’t think it’s a good fit for this county. We have a highly populated rural area along with a fairly large urban center,” she says. “And, we just have feelings that it could impact this whole county as far as financially – it could be an economic downturn.”
The county does not have regulations on the books for wind farms. It will hold public hearings before finalizing regulations, likely sometime next year.
Far northwest Missouri is the only slice of the state with wind turbines.
