Utah County cities seek wind energy from Idaho farm

SPRINGVILLE — Three Utah County cities are working toward wind energy from an Idaho farm that could be operational by 2011.

The Horse Butte wind farm is planning to generate 100 megawatts of electricity, of which Springville will get 5 megawatts, said Leon Fredrickson, the city's power manager. Lehi is slated to receive 7 megawatts, and Eagle Mountain is to get 1 megawatt. All told, 21 cities are involved in the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems project southeast of Idaho Falls.

Wind turbines are just one source cities are looking at to meet a 2008 Utah Legislature mandate that 20 percent of their power come from renewable energy sources, Fredrickson said.

The wind farm will need 66 1.5-megawatt turbines or 44 2.3-megawatt turbines to generate 100 megawatts. The projected cost of the wind farm is $270 million, with Springville's portion estimated at $11 million. No figures were immediately available for Eagle Mountain's or Lehi's costs.

"This will result in an estimated $1.053 million in annual costs to our budgets," Springville city administrator Troy Fitzgerald said.

However, city leaders plan to sell more power, which would result in an increase of about $200,000, he said.

The turbines' capacity is just 30 percent, so it would become part of the energy mix and not replace traditional sources, such as coal, said Matt Hancock, power generation superintendent.

"Solar is worse (financially) than wind," Hancock told the Springville City Council during a work session Wednesday.

The city also is eyeing hydroelectric power from Diamond Fork Canyon, where a plan is in the works to install 50-megawatt turbines in vertical shafts that carry water from Strawberry Reservoir to Utah County. However, when the federal government built the Central Utah Project pipeline five years ago, it assigned $161 million of the system's costs to be repaid through the sale of electricity from future development of hydropower.

But the turbines may never go in with that charge looming overhead, Fredrickson said.

Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, said during a recent congressional hearing that "any hydropower facility developed at Diamond Fork is $161 million in the hole before any dirt has been turned" to build power plants.

Bennett has asked that the government "permanently defer" the $161 million.

Without the turbines in place, the energy from the cascading water is wasted, Fredrickson said.

"We're losing production," he said.

e-mail: rodger@desnews.com