Wind power energizes rural Oregon county

The main image on Oregon's license plates is a tall pine tree. It remains fitting geographically, but the decline of the timber industry and the rise of another means another tall, straight centerpiece would be more fitting economically: a wind turbine.

“Wind is the only thing that is going to save rural Oregon, especially since all the timber is gone and the sawmills and all that are closing down. I think what it is is a breath of fresh air,” Judge Gary Thompson of the Sherman County Court told Lee Van Der Voo of The New York Times.

Sherman County (Wikipedia map) lies partly in the gorge of the Columbia River, "an expressway for hard-blowing wind since long before the turbines arrived," Van Der Voo reports from the county seat of Moro. "Trees here lean to the east from the gusts that rip across the plateau." County taxes, fees and assessments on wind farms have brought it $17.5 million since the first 300-foot-tall turbine was erected in 2002. The county shares the wealth with every head of household who has lived in there for a year, sending annual payments of $590, just under the $600 threshold at which the county would have to file individual reports to the Internal Revenue Service.

The intent is "to reward residents who have made no financial gains from wind energy development, but whose views of Mount Adams and the county’s stunning landscape now include a panorama of turbines," the Times reports. "It’s modeled after a lot of Alaska compensation," Thompson told the newspaper, noting how the 49th state distributes oil wealth to Alaska natives. "There are a lot of people who live in the county who are not necessarily going to benefit from the renewable energy, and we felt we needed to share it with all the county residents." Van Der Voo writes, "Critics say that the incentives are overly generous and that they take money from hard-pressed state budgets. In Sherman County, however, the arrangement has helped build a library and two new city halls, sewers and a bridge." (Read more)