To the editor:

While reading the editorial in last Friday’s paper (September 20) I found myself agreeing with most of the statements about Reynolds, Feenstra and eminent domain. I also wish that we would have gotten the three windmills that had been proposed for the hill north of Webster City and the river bluff south of town, but the wind farm by Blairsburg precluded that becoming a reality.

I disagree with the statement that wind energy is inefficient and characterizes it as only possible because of government support.

It’s the same support that was used after World War II to electrify rural America. It was part of the programs initiated by Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower. The same philosophy that provided the incentives for private companies to invest in America.

The ability to tailor the amount of wind generation to demand makes it cheaper per kilowatt hour than gas/turbine generation. The average boiler used for industrial use is 10 million BTU/hr, but for steam generation, it’s 36 million BTU/hr. When you don’t need the generation you can’t just shut the boiler off, it has to be put in standby and continues to burn natural gas to keep the boiler hot and takes hours to bring up to generation pressures. Once a year the boiler has to be shutdown, the tubes and tube sheet cleaned and inspected. It can take a week to cool down and another week to ready it for inspection and then refilled and put on low heat start up which can take another week to get up to stand by mode. If the tubes or tube sheet need to be replaced or repaired, add another couple of weeks.

A year ago, wind generation on an average day provided 88% of Iowa’s needs and on a good day 103%.

The growth of Iowa’s wind generation will, like Texas, give Iowa an exportable energy source that will bring more money and jobs into Iowa and hopefully the money to bring Iowa’s education and health care systems back into the top 15 instead of the bottom 15.

Michael Dingman

Webster City