WINCHESTER, Ind. — A wind farm with up to 100 electricity-generating turbines is being planned for a rural area of an eastern Indiana county.
The project is being developed by Houston-based EDP Renewables North America across a stretch of farmland south of the Randolph County city of Winchester. It is estimated to cost $350 million to $400 million, The Star Press of Muncie reported.
“We don’t have all the details solidified yet, so those are only ballpark figures,” company spokesman Adam Renz said. “But this is a sizable project.”
Major construction is expected to start next spring and be completed by the end of 2014, Renz said.
The subsidiary of Spanish company EDP Renovaveis has an agreement with Indiana Michigan Power for the utility to buy electricity from the proposed Headwaters Wind Farm in the area about 25 miles east of Muncie.
Indiana Michigan Power said the wind power contract is part of its efforts to meet a 2007 agreement between parent company AEP and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to increase its purchase of renewable energy. That agreement settled litigation over alleged violations of the Clean Air Act by AEP’s coal-fueled power plants in Indiana and other states.
Two other companies have gained the approval of Randolph County officials for wind farm projects there, while opponents in neighboring Delaware County are fighting proposed turbine construction.
Several hundred turbines are operating at wind farms north of Lafayette.
Construction finished late last year on 125 turbines in Tipton and Madison counties for the Wildcat Wind Farm. Nearly 200 more turbines are planned in neighboring Howard and Grant counties during later phases in the area about 40 miles north of Indianapolis.
