Deal would move planned wind farm

SPANISH FORK — Residents, developers and city officials in Spanish Fork are inching closer to a mutual agreement that would relocate a planned wind farm that has generated the ire of homeowners near the area where it was originally planned to be built.

"I would summarize our meetings as very positive," Spanish Fork Mayor Joe Thomas said at Tuesday's City Council meeting. "There are no guarantees, but we'll continue to move down that path. We hope to have a concrete progress report in two weeks, and I'm optimistic that will happen."

Under the current plan, developer Wasatch Winds would build nine wind turbines — each one 407 feet tall from the ground to the tip of the blade — on the north side of the mouth of Spanish Fork Canyon.

When residents who were concerned about the site began to protest the wind-farm plan last month, Wasatch Winds agreed to look for an alternate site.

A site has been identified. It is farther up the canyon on its south side, behind the Fingerhut distribution building, but much work remains to be done.

Wasatch Winds would have to sign lease deals with three different landowners and then go through a four-month annexation process to move all of the land into the city.

The company would also have to repeat numerous steps, including obtaining zoning approval, commissioning construction surveys and drawing up a site plan. All those steps have already been done for the current site in the past year, at the expense of roughly $300,000.

"We have to do everything over again, and then some," said Christine Watson Mikell, project director for Wasatch Winds. "Initially it was frustrating because we felt we tried to get the citizens informed . . . but I think it's going to work out, and everyone will be satisfied."

Mikell said the alternate site is better than her company initially believed, and was confident the project could be successful there. In her presentation at Tuesday's meeting, she said she was 90 percent sure Wasatch Winds would be able to move the project, but doing so primarily rests on the ability to obtain the leases.

She agreed that the process of working out a solution with city leaders and residents has been positive.

"(City leaders) are trying to do the right thing, and we respect that," Mikell said. "We also respect the citizens for bringing these points up."

Aaron Fisher, who is a member of a three-person committee appointed by the city to represent concerned residents, said he and his neighbors are not trying to punish Wasatch Winds.

"If we can get them to an appropriate place, we'll be happy," he said. "None of us are against the developer, and we don't want to see" the company lose money.