PHOENIX — When it comes to building wind farms, how close is too close?
Six miles, according to proponents of legislation awaiting an Arizona House vote. It would bar any wind farm within that distance of anyone else’s property without that person’s consent.
The wind farm also would have to be at least 12 miles from any property zoned for residential development.
House Bill 2223 also would require county supervisors to first hold a public hearing and mandate that any approved development have sufficient financial bonds to assure that any traces are cleaned up once the turbines are no longer functional.
If approved and signed into law, it would put a halt to many projects in the works: Restrictions would be retroactive to Jan. 1.
The measure written by Rep. David Marshall, a Snowflake Republican, is drawing opposition, from companies that want to erect more towers as well as from environmental interests. They say wind farms provide a clean option to generate needed power.
But some lawmakers, including Rep. Teresa Martinez, said windmills are not a practical solution to energy needs. The Casa Grande Republican said she prefers more reliable sources such as coal and nuclear power.
Rep. Nick Kupper, R-Surprise, said that once wind farms outlive their useful lives they leave behind things like huge fiberglass blades. Even if the above-ground portions are removed, there’s the issue of the metals and cables left in the ground, he said.
The most immediate question, however, is who would want to live near one. Marshall said his constituents do not want them.
Some of it is a question of property rights and property values.
“There’s nothing in the statutes that prevents a windmill from being put right next to my property,’’ said Mike Anable, a former state land commissioner who lives in the area.
“It’ll be 700 feet up there and totally destroy the value,’’ he told the House Committee on Natural Resources, Energy and Water. “These windmills will be so close to my property that when the sun comes up in the morning, the one at the east there will throw its shadow on my place. That’s way too close.’’
It would also be visual pollution, Anable said. On a clear day, he said, he can see windmills that are 23 miles away in New Mexico.
The complaint that the windmills are ugly drew a question from Rep. Patty Contreras, a Phoenix Democrat.
“There have been coal plants up in that area that are polluting the air and causing issues with lungs and illnesses and stuff like that,’’ she said.
Anable didn’t address her health questions. Instead he talked about what people can see.
“This is an area that is open, grassy, cinder cones, extremely beautiful,’’ Anable said. “You can see all the way into New Mexico. And so now you’re going to be looking at 110 700-foot-tall windmills between my house and New Mexico.”
He also pointed to property rights and whether his property values will be undermined.
But Stan Barnes, lobbyist for the Interwest Energy Alliance, which arranges to place these windmills, said lawmakers need to understand why they exist.
“The answer is markets want it, because economics supports it, because local elected officials approve it, and because local landowners, exercising their property rights, make money on it,’’ he said.
Barnes said the operations, like all generating facilities, pay millions of dollars in property taxes, much of which go to public schools and local governments.
Anyway, Barnes said, county supervisors already have the power to refuse to allow wind farms or, if they do, to place conditions such as requiring a set-aside for removing them at the end of their useful lives.
What it all comes down to, he said, is the not-in-my-backyard argument.
“A lot of people don’t want a lot of things in their backyards,’’ Barnes said. “But that’s no reason to give thumbs down on the entire private sector of this industry.’’
Rep. Ralph Heap had questions about reliability, given that the wind doesn’t always blow. Barnes conceded the point, saying that’s why there needs to be a mix of available energy sources.
Heap also said that what makes wind financially attractive — at least on the surface — is artificial: the various federal tax breaks provided to incentivize wind farms. Here, too, Barnes acknowledged that is part of what makes it cost competitive.
Another issue is evidence that windmills kill birds and bats.
Sandy Bahr, director of the Grand Canyon Chapter of the Sierra Club, said that has to be put into perspective.
“Buildings, cars and cats that are outdoors kill a lot of birds,’’ she told lawmakers, adding that work is being done to reduce the impact.
Bahr also said lawmakers have to look at this from a larger perspective. She said wind and other alternative sources of energy reduce the need to rely on power plants that emit greenhouse gases.
“We can save ourselves and the animals we share this planet with,’’ Bahr said. “Climate change kills a heck of a lot more wildlife than any wind turbine ever will.’’
Jineane Ford, a former Phoenix TV anchor who now hosts a radio show in the White Mountains, told lawmakers there’s another environmental factor that must be considered.
She said even if windmills are removed at the end of their useful lives — considered around 30 years — and even if the fiberglass blades can be recycled, the concrete, metals and cables remain in the ground. These are often right above the water table in the area, Ford said.
“None of the people that are ‘green’ advocates know how dirty they are,’’ she said. “They leave a big, giant, dirty footprint.’’
Ford, saying she’s speaking for many residents in the area, did not dispute that some ranchers say the windmills and the revenues they produce help them stay on their land. But she accused them of a “money grab’’ and “having sold out.’’
One provision of the measure approved by the panel got a raised eyebrow from Bahr.
It requires formation of a “wind farm health impacts study committee’’ to study everything from impacts on the human body from vibrations, electromagnetic fields, blinking tower lights and audible noise. The panel also would study whether toxins leach into the soil.
Bahr noted that there are no similar requirements for any other kind of power plant.
And Rep. Sarah Liguori, D-Tucson, listed issues from other options.
“Children living within a mile of a frack gas well were seven times more likely to develop lymphoma,’’ she said. There are also compounds and explosions from leaky gas lines, she said.
“Coal, in a 21-year study, 480 plants, it was found that 460,000 deaths would not have occurred in the absence of emissions from the coal plants,’’ Liguori said.
Arizona is not known for its wind energy. But there are areas in the northeast area of the state where the conditions apparently are good enough so that several projects already have been completed.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, wind amounted to less than 2% of total generated power in Arizona in 2023. The same agency also said Arizona is among the top 10 states in wind energy potential.
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