Flickertail Winds Project Update
The Herald Press writer, Neil Nelson, wrote a newspaper article about the recent Wells County, ND Commissioners’ meeting. The article reads like he is confusing two separate issues as interchangeable projects as he switches back and forth between the two of them. The Commissioners have before them right now issues of the gifting of the Garrison Diversion canal and the other topic is the PRC Wind Project called Flickertail Winds. We will focus on the latter for this article.
Flickertail Winds project by Mr. Tim Rost proposed 15 wind turbines for Wells County of the statue of 700 feet tall with the projected production of 370 megawatts. Flickertail Winds will sell electricity to Minnikota Power Cooperative by a long-term contract which could be from 37 years. The electricity produced by Flickertail Winds will be transmission to Grandforks, North Dakota then it is transferred into a Minnesota station. The construction is scheduled for 2027, if they can obtain their permits depending on the county setback ordinances. Wells County zoning hearing came back with a one-mile setback that upset Mr. Rost. As my previous article stated, Mr. Rost presented his case now before the commissioners.
Flickertail Wind Farm will be established on 43,000 acres of crop land, not pastureland between Wells County and Eddy County. Mr. Rost told the commissioners that one-mile setback will kill the project, and he stated his desire is one-half of a mile. The commissioners repeated the knowledge they obtained from Mr. Rost about the creation of 300 jobs for our area. Windindustrynd.com states that the permanence of these jobs is an axiom: accepted as truth without proof. The jobs created by preparation, installations and maintenance come from Minnesota’s PRC company employees. Yes, the benefit in jobs, but does not benefit Wells County people. The wind company receives subsidies in the form of tax credits. Each distribution of a tax credit is made possible and produced by taxpayers in order for the government to be able to give such a tax credit. Commissioner Stan Buxa and auditor Dan Stutlein have stated over and over that in order to speak at the meetings, you must have “skin in the game”. Each taxpayer across this nation has skin in the game through the subsidies of tax credits. This brings me to Mr. Rost’ comment about Eddy County pirating the meeting.
My hope is that the Commissioners have asked a lot of questions, and they have done their due diligence in research on this matter; however, the gathering of outside information could change your perspective. At “thecentersquare.com” reported information on the Title 26; subsection 45 of federal law that covers this push of green energy. This is the Internal Revenue code for tax credits for green energy. On the federal level, a tax credit for every kilowatt-hour of electricity generated up to 30% for up to 10 years. Then the Biden’s, “Reduction Act Credits” created additional subsidies. Once again, the cooperations get the tax breaks and the little guy pays for them. Perhaps these tax credits is what PRC is fighting for to keep their business going. If that is the case, when the commissioners had ask if the project can sustain itself, the answer of yes would be all exclusive with tax credits. The margin of profit to share with the landowner, county roads and community involvement and not to mention the state through legislation could be a encirclement of taxes redistribution. Wonder if PRC would share their financial projections with the public before getting the job? Most large tax jobs are bid upon.
These federal subsidies enable the intermittent energy companies to operate for a set amount of time, then what usually happens is the smaller companies reaps what they can then sell the rest of the contract to a larger company. The landowners “non-disclosure contracts” last for say 37 years, and the federal subsidies end in the 10 years, who picks up the slack of that production contract? The “center square” reporter covers the storage batteries not being cost effective. The commissioners spoke in their last meeting about getting storage batteries when the people stated that Wells County will not be benefiting from the electrical energy production directly. Mr. Nelson from Herald Press writes about the “Millions in Revenues”. There will be 89 wind turbines from Wells County and Eddy counties both. Mr. Rost said 59 wind turbines are planned for Wells County. A lot has changed on the Flickertail Wind Farm being 112 before. After the state redistributes the one million dollar profit to the county, the county portion is approximately $200,000.00. The Million dollar in revenue is for whole project. The 112 wind turbines decreasing to 89 total means something is happening in the background.
I received a call in the morning of 5/10/25. The private number told me very little about the wind turbine project and he asked if I would like to receive a booklet on the project, of course I do. This individual did not ask me for my address, yet he states that the booklet will be mailed out. This tells me one thing, the county auditor gave him a list of the county landowners. The possibility of that is because he called my cell phone number. I am interested in their side; matter of fact, I am interested in all sides.
Being that he did not give me his name, I once again looked into some more facts. Did you know that North Dakota ranks number one in crop production of Wheat, edible beans and sunflower oil? This was based on 2024NDDA.ND.gov ag numbers. So, if we are taking 43,000 acres of crop land for wind farms (est. by Mr. Rost), this has to hurt the final production. Research shows that the crop directly under the wind turbines mature height is not the same due to the small impact of wind turbines on the local temperature. The taller turbines mix the different air levels and disrupt the wind energy to capture it. This action creates higher temperatures at the ground level, so they say in an article about the Texas wind farms by thecentersquare.com. Texas has had many wind farms for a long time now. We can glean from their experience. North Dakota has been a powerhouse for the agricultural of the nation so why are we producing electricity for Minnesota?
A website call Star Tribune reports in 2018, “Judge’s ruling against Minnesota Wind Farm cause alarm for advocates”. A $300 million freeborn Wind farm project of only 42 turbines in Freeborn County and 82 Turbines in Worth county, Iowa was supposed to be a Minnesota project only but it changed due to landowners opposition. A Chicago-based Invenergy moved a chunk of it across the border. The Judgement was on health issues such as shadow flicker, loss of sleep, epilepsy and noise. I then looked for a more recent event.
On May 5, 2025, the Minnesota Attorney General Ellison joined a lawsuit filing against the Trump Administration over attempt to freeze development of wind energy. In the lawsuit, Mr. Ellison makes claims about the importance of wind energy in Minnesota; yet, neighbors, landowners and contracted leasers are fighting against each other over a wind project located in North Dakota of which will be sending all the electricity to Minnesota. I guess the democrat state of Minnesota wants the republican state of North Dakota to be plague with turbines in their scenery and sunsets because their landowners rejected them. Even NDSU has a section where it was suggested to the legislators that a North Dakota landowner should not negotiate his contract himself. He should hire an attorney that specializes in this area because the corporation’s language is one of a kind to an unsuspecting landowner.
Nelson titled another column in the paper, “Farm development in County at Risk”. Neil quotes Dan Stutlien, “We have 3,800 people within Wells County”. Neil writes that Mr. Stutlien implied that who’s to say that another wind farm won’t be built in the county. How many are the commissioners planning on? Ordinance regulates the whole county by the setback that is set. Why do you think PRC fights against the one-mile setback, it limits their advancement through the county?
The North Dakota legislature requirements are met stated Mr. Rost, but the permits need to come from our county commissioners by the meeting of zoning setbacks. The county commissioners already stated that they could override the zoning setback decision. Perhaps, that would bring the heat on them directly. So, what do you do next? You delay and negotiate for less with variances between the landowner and the PRC Wind. You give them open records of names, addresses, and phone numbers of Wells County landowners to contact. PRC then divides up the list of landowners by 100 and starts calling them to increase their support through providing persuasive material before the next zoning meeting or public forum; hence, I believe is why I received my call this morning.
