02/26/07 Idaho Energy, Grover`s Wind

Jared Grover got a great deal on 300 acres of land he bought near Hagerman and when he got the power bill for pumping irrigation water he knew why. GROVER "Within just a matter of a few years, within about four or five years my power rates almost doubled. It was costing me 60 thousand dollars and all of a sudden my little 300 acre farm wasn't worth farming." Grover told the Idaho Ag Summit that he and his father-in-law turned to wind power. GROVER "The biggest thing about wind is that you have to pay the capital costs. Everybody knows the fuel is free." Grover says wind power could supply half the new electrical generation needed to meet Idaho demand by 2015. GROVER "I mean that works out to be about 260 megawatts of wind that we need here in Idaho." With the construction of new wind turbines on his farm this summer he's thinking beyond Idaho's border by selling that power to out of state buyers. GROVER "Because that's where it really comes down to it as farmers and as an agricultural benefit to Idaho that's what we're going to need to do." Grover contends that he'll make an average 150 dollars for each of his farm acres from lease payments he receives. For farmers near transmission lines there are millions of dollars in potential land-lease payments if they want to get into wind power development. Today's Idaho Ag News Bill Scott