Economy stalls local wind farm

The plan to erect wind turbines on the Burnside Mountain south of Shamokin has been stalled because of the sour economy.

Penn Wind LLC is still actively pursuing the project, but the failure of some of the nation's largest financial institutions makes the market for the important tax-credit piece of financing for such a large project a tough one, said Justin Dunkelberger, the company's CEO.

Dunkelberger, a native of the Irish Valley, detailed Penn Wind's "county ground project" in a presentation at Tuesday's Brush Valley Regional Chamber of Commerce meeting, held this month at Brewser's SportsGrille.

The 2001 Penn State engineering graduate said Penn Wind was hoping to begin construction of what will likely be nine turbines this year, but the number of companies that can provide the final 30 percent of tax-credit-based financing has dwindled, and "the big companies that are still standing are being very selective" in what they finance, Dunkelberger said after his presentation.

"We have the money, the turbines and the project, but not the tax equity," he said.

Penn Wind hopes to build nine 2-megawatt turbines, but that's tentative; it could be nine turbines that produce 1.5 megawatts, or some other variation, depending on when construction begins and what's available from manufacturers at that time. One megawatt is enough electricity to power 812 four-person homes, Dunkelberger said.

County lease

Penn Wind late last year signed a $1 per year lease with Northumberland County for exploratory purposes on 470 acres of county land. It has since erected two "met" (meteorological) towers on the property to collect data and relay it by cellular signal for analysis. The flag pole-like towers are about 196 feet tall; under 200 feet keeps them from FAA requirements of installing a beacon, Dunkelberger said.

Once turbines are operating on that land, the company will pay the county $10,000 per turbine per year royalty plus $1,500 per megawatt produced. That would equal $90,000 for the turbines plus $27,000 if the nine 2-megawatt units are erected. The royalties could be split between the county, municipality (Coal Township) and the school district, (Shamokin Area).

Dunkelberger said inexpensive exploratory leases are not unusual in such developments.

"We're not encumbering any property," he said.

He noted, too, that Penn Wind will ultimately need much less land.

"We just need the top of the ridge and the (access) road," he said, "which we'll maintain," he added. Each turbine requires about 1 to 1.5 acres.

Northumberland County Commissioner Vinny Clausi showed up at the chamber meeting and questioned Dunkelberger about the lease and Penn Wind's need for so much county land.

Clausi is apparently not satisfied with the lease deal signed last year just before he joined the board of commissioners, although he would not say after the meeting exactly what his reason was for questioning Dunkelberger during his public presentation.

Growing industry

While Penn Wind is a small Sunbury-based company, it is affiliated with an international alternative energy giant in German renewable energy company Juwi GmbH. That company also started small, Dunkelberger said, but now employs 400 people on a $25 million campus in its home country. The company's projects produced 400 megawatts of power last year at 700 installations worldwide.

Dunkelberger said the American Wind Energy Association has a goal of wind energy providing 20 percent of the United States' energy needs by 2030, when energy demands could be 40 percent higher than they are now. There are wind farms in 36 states, he said.

Dunkelberger noted that wind farm development has led to tax-free living for some residents of upstate New York, and that the industry is creating manufacturing and other jobs, including at a blade building facility in Ebensburg, Cambria County.

But the development can be difficult, as Penn Wind and others have to deal with myriad state agencies for development, including those that are concerned with bird migration and bat populations.