Business has been slow, so dairy farmer Bernie Kozlovsky could use a little extra cash as much as the next guy. But a developer's offer of $6,000 annually for access to his property has Kozlovsky - and many of his neighbors - conflicted about whether to welcome a wind farm into southern Brown County. The proposal by Chicago-based Invenergy LLC would be Brown County's first major commercial wind farm and would be larger than any currently operating in the state.

[Walter] Wiersma, of Friesland, was one of many people at the standing-room-only hearing who said worries about the health effects, safety and noise from wind turbines in a 17,300-acre area of the towns of Scott and Randolph, should lead the commission to reject the We Energies proposal for Glacier Hills Wind Park. "I'm for green energy," he said, "but I don't want it to hurt my family and friends." The afternoon and evening sessions for the hearing were moved from the Randolph Town Hall to the Friesland Village Hall to accommodate more people.

Walter Wiersma considered introducing a photo of his children - 5-year-old Spencer and 3-year-old Rianna - into the written record of Wednesday's Public Service Commission of Wisconsin hearing to illustrate his opposition to electricity-generating wind turbines in northeast Columbia County. Wiersma, of Friesland, was one of many people at the standing-room-only hearings who said worries about the health effects, safety and noise from wind turbines, in a 17,300-acre area in the towns of Scott and Randolph, should lead the commission to reject the We Energies proposal for Glacier Hills Wind Park.

We Energies has run into some headwinds in its bid to build the biggest wind farm in the state. The Glacier Hills Wind Park project in Columbia County would consist of 90 turbines rising at least 400 feet above corn fields near the village of Friesland, northeast of Madison. The Milwaukee utility proposed the project, its second large wind farm, as part of an expansion of renewable energy to comply with a state law that passed with bipartisan support in 2006. The law calls for wind turbines and other renewable energy systems to power 10% of the state's electricity by 2015.