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Catching the Wind. Towering turbines on rural ridge lines could signal the future of energy in Idaho

Forty-three wind turbines, each as tall as a 20-story building, rise from the rolling hills around Bone and stretch for nearly six miles. Lending an unexpected, European look to this rural corner of southeast Idaho, they evoke Danish landscapes or postcards from Holland.

Steve Rhodes, whose family has ranched and farmed for four generations on nearby Crippled Couple Ranch, admits that the windmills "took some getting used to."

"They changed the landscape. But now I think they’re kinda pretty. This is something I’ve dreamed about all my life. The wind blows most of the time out here. I’ve always thought somebody ought to do something about it."

Somebody is. Compared with the mass of a hydroelectric dam or the stacks of a coal-fired plant, the Wolverine Creek Wind Farm looks benign, almost low-tech. Few would guess that the pale gray turbine blades spinning almost silently in the green hills around Bone provide enough electricity to power 12,000 homes.

Tim Woodward
Idaho Statesman

Full Story: http://www.idahostatesman.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060903/NEWS01/609030338

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