Rochester is surrounded by the kind of ground that military strategists seek out before the battle: the high ground. This ground is also sought by at least two and probably more companies seeking the high ground for possible locations of wind farms.

I am a part of a group of landowners from the Eyota-Viola area who are involved in the planning stages of starting a wind farm east of Rochester. What a wonderful, green, and patriotic thing to do -- provide the public with green, renewable energy. What could possibly be wrong with wind energy?

Well, I'm having second thoughts -- not about my friends and neighbors or the people helping develop this project, but wind energy in general. The electricity produced by wind farms is as fickle as the wind itself. Power companies are mandated to buy this expensive, unreliable energy, and they pass the costs along to consumers.

These are not your grandfather's windmills that pumped water many years ago. Those were efficient machines. They pumped the water, and that that was not used was stored in the cistern. When the cistern was full you pulled the lever that turned the vane and shut off the windmill. When the wind didn't blow for a long time, and the cistern was running low, you hooked up one of those small engines that you see at antique shows or a small electric motor. These windmills were 30 to 40 feet high and could be controlled by their owner.

Some modern wind turbines are 240 feet to the hub, swinging three 120-foot blades. They are taller than the Statue of Liberty (including pedestal and base) and have a wingspan of a 747. By day they are a spinning, distracting disturbance, and by night they have flashing red lights that require a person living under them to keep their drapes closed.

And when the wind doesn't blow, or blows too strong, there is no storage for previously produced energy. That means wind turbines have to be backed up by a reliable and instant source of energy. Wind power does nothing to encourage conservation. Yes, it's free -- until it is time to back it up.

These wind turbines are controlled by the company through easements the farmer signs, thus handing over control of his/her land for a few thousand dollars a year. Concerns that people raise over noise and visual disturbance are quickly put down. The noise of a turbine spinning at more than 100 miles per hour is said to be no louder than a refrigerator. The visual spinning with the accompanying shadow and flicker are called majestic.

You don't have to travel to the wind farm at Dexter to see them, they are visible from Highway 9 east of Rochester and from my dining room window, more than 30 miles away.

I could think of no worse way to spoil the peace and tranquility of my neighbor than to subject him/her to spinning, whirring blades by day and flashing red lights by night. It seems ironic that as the bald eagle is returning to our area, people who would otherwise claim to be environmentalists would put giant swinging blades in their way.

Each turbine requires a pad and pier base 8.5 feet deep, 50 feet in diameter, filled with 25,000 pounds of reinforced steel and 180 yards of concrete, plus the material to build the turbine, plus a road built to it.

Township roads are not built to take this kind of beating. To continue to use our valuable resources to manufacture and construct machines that produce the most unreliable source of electricity seems extremely ill advised.

I congratulate the Minnesota Senate for giving their preliminary approval to overturn the moratorium on the construction of new nuclear plants. The plant at Prairie Island has been humming along since 1973, with its 1,076 megawatt producing capability occupying 520 acres.

The Eyota-Viola wind project's goal is a meager 65 megawatts with a plant covering 8,000 acres. To turn our best farmland into an industrial park with skyscrapers is urban sprawl at its worst and hardly seems an efficient use of space.

Getting together with neighbors to support community-oriented projects can be rewarding and fun. Next time let's try a winery or a community theater, or let's just get together and play cards.