I’m Matthew Moore. I’m joined by Jacqueline Froelich who has an update on Nimbus, a $300 million private wind energy facility. The project is being led by Scout Clean Energy, a company headquartered in Colorado that has proposed the construction of the wind farm in eastern Carroll County.
Matthew Moore: As you’ve reported, if this Nimbus project goes through, it will be the largest wind farm in Arkansas, with 43 towers erected across 10,000 acres of Ozark Mountain ridgetop south of Green Forest. Have all the necessary property easements been obtained?
Jacqueline Froelich: Yes, sufficient lease contracts are signed by willing rural property owners, who will be financially compensated. Apparently, Scout Clean Energy land agents scoured eastern Carroll County for years, with no public disclosure, to obtain the easements. Reporter Becky Gillette, with the Eureka Springs Independent, first broke the story early this year.
MM: Why do this in Carroll County of all places?
JF: Wind maps reveal mountain ridges south of Green Forest to be prime terrain due to the topography. But it will take ginormous wind towers, standing 500 to 650 feet tall, turbines and blades several hundred feet long to catch enough wind to be sold on the energy market.
MM: Have you talked with any Scout folks recently about the project status?
JF: Yes, Chad Thompson, community relations, responded by email recently saying the company has not yet identified an "offtaker" – an industry term referring to a power supply purchaser. Scout must also build a new transmission facility to deliver the power to the offtaker via an existing substation owned by Arkansas Electric Cooperative Corporation. Depending on who buys the power, state energy regulators may get involved requiring a docket and hearings in Little Rock. Scout wants to avoid all that.
MM: This isn’t the only reason that Nimbus has targeted Carroll County, though.
JF: Carroll County Quorum Court is comprised of majority private property rights advocates, so Scout has free reign to build the wind farm – aside from U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service review which is pending.
MM: But you say there is a wrench in the works?
JF: Yes— Several wrenches. The newly formed Concerned Citizens of Carroll County says Nimbus construction as well as future rural roads expansion will harm the region’s sensitive karst ecosystem, as well as bats and birds. Residents also worry about nuisance flicker and noise caused by the massive turbines. Former Carroll County Judge Richard Williams owns a small farm that could be surrounded by Nimbus wind towers. He tried to speak at a recent county quorum court meeting.
They refused, the county judge refused to allow me to even bring it up, period.Richard Williams
JF: According to a recording I obtained from a county official, things were tense at that meeting because an emergency ordinance sponsored by a Justice of the Peace to establish rules and regulations to control tower installations and associated noise in Carroll County failed, six to five. A surprisingly close vote.
MM: So that’s good news for Scout Clean Energy?
JF: Yes, because Scout is under pressure of hitting a deadline before the end of next year. They have to deploy Nimbus by then to qualify for more than $100 million in federal clean energy tax credits over the life of the facility. That’s one-third of the project’s cost. We can all agree that transitioning to clean energy is imperative given our climate crisis. But this private for-profit wind array, a growing number of locals say, is an intrusion.
MM: You were told by Richard Williams that Scout officials launched a public relations campaign this summer in an attempt to spur public support using a Green Forest postal code?
JF: I asked Chad Thompson about this and he responded in writing that since going public with the project last spring Scout Clean Energy has worked to educate the public about the benefits of the Nimbus Wind Farm to Carroll County and the potential impacts if County officials were to prohibit the development of the project. Thompson is likely referring to loss of tax revenue and easement payments if the project is abandoned. Thompson also disclosed to me that the company delivered 500 letters of support from County residents asking county officials to “protect private property rights.” An astonishing move by a private industry.
MM: Perhaps the strangest element of this update, in my opinion at least, is this long-lost comprehensive land use ordinance that was approved by Carroll County quorum court back in 2011 but never filed. It was recently salvaged by a county clerk?
JF: Yeah, the document was discovered in a collection of papers scheduled for shredding, according to Richard Williams, retrieved and filed by County Clerk Connie Doss, conducting due diligence. The thing is this decade-old ordinance, which could regulate construction of the Nimbus project, may never be taken up by the majority pro-private property rights quorum court. It remains tabled for now.
MM: And finally the new nonprofit -- Concerned Citizens of Carroll County has recently hired Fayetteville Attorney Matt Bishop to intervene. Bishop is a native of Carroll County?
JF: Yes. I called him up to see what he has planned.
I think we're looking at all options. We're looking at the possibility of litigation, or looking at making sure that Scout meets all their requirements to provide the proper analysis of for example 'taking' of migratory birds.Matt Bishop
JF: Take is USFWS jargon for allowed killing of a certain quota of wildlife during industrial development and operations. I queried Scout about this and was told a USFWS decision should be issued by early next year. The location of the proposed wind farm is fairly pristine, covered in forests, prairies and farms, where Scout, I was told, is ready to break ground as soon as late autumn.
MM: That’s Ozarks at Large news reporter, Jacqueline Froelich, updating us on the proposed Nimbus industrial wind project in eastern Carroll County.
