startribune.com
Grant for wind energy puts state atop program
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October 21, 2005

Minnesota's push to develop renewable energy has gotten a nation-leading boost from the U.S. government, a federal official noted at a State Capitol news conference Thursday.

Thomas Dorr, undersecretary of agriculture for rural development, said a grant of $4 million to help a southwestern Minnesota group erect 15 large 2-megawatt wind turbines brings to $13.9 million the amount the state has reaped from the Agriculture Department's three-year-old renewable-energy-grant program.

That represents more than 20 percent of the program's nationwide total of $66.6 million, officials said. Other leading grant beneficiaries are Wisconsin, $9.4 million; Iowa, $7.2 million, and New York, $5.3 million. No other state got more than $3.5 million.

"Minnesota has provided an inordinate amount of leadership on renewable energy," Dorr said, beginning with ethanol initiatives in the 1970s. That, along with the "tenacity and foresight" of the state's political and business leaders, explains Minnesota's good fortune in the competition for federal grants, he added.

David Norgaard, president of Community Wind North LLC in Lincoln County, said the $4 million grant to his group will help area residents reap the benefits of development. With earlier wind projects, "most of the profits were leaving our area and going to large out-of-state corporations," he said.

CONRAD DEFIEBRE
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