Standing near the corner of his property in southeastern Reno County, Nick Egli looked east and pointed to the proposed locations for several 500-feet-tall wind turbines. Egli is standing on a grass airstrip he’s spent the last 10 years building. He pictures a few more homes, some hangars and, eventually, a residential community for pilots of small planes.
“If there’s turbines there, you’ve completely killed everything I’ve been working on the last 10 years,” he said.
Egli is one of many people in the area fighting against a wind farm proposed by Florida-based NextEra Energy.
It’s the latest of several projects NextEra has already completed in the state. And the company isn’t alone.
Businesses from all over the world have cashed in on Kansas’ abundant wind in the past decade. Most projects went up without much fanfare.
But stiff opposition facing the Reno County project has raised some anxiety in the industry as companies consider its implications for future development.
(Read more: Junction City Post)