With no public updates on the Star Ridge-Run Energy Wind Farm for over a year, the Presque Isle County board of commissioners had a visit from Brad Norden on July 13 at their meeting to present on the project.
Norden is the operations manager and consultant that was hired by Lotus Infrastructure, partnered with Starwood Energy, which bought the lease from Sstar Ridge Run-Energy. The project is now referred to as Moltke Ridge Wind Farm.
Throughout the meeting on Thursday evening Norden continued to emphasize that he is a consultant for the company, not an employee.
“I’m open to ideas, and I just want to let you guys know, I am here for you guys,” he said. “I am not an employee for them (Lotus Infrastructure).
“You know how big developers are, sometimes they try to push something on somebody that is smaller. And I’m that middle person to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
One of the commissioners interjected to say they felt that was what the previous company was doing.
“They were pretty aggressive, and I think that’s what hurt them,” he said.
Norden had admitted that when he was reviewing the paperwork from the previous company, some of the things that had been promised to landowners were not there.
He mentioned there were back leases that hadn’t been paid which is why Lotus hired Norden to go out to Presque Isle to examine the situation. Norden said he has met with landowners that had former leases in the project to continue to develop new leases and keep everyone informed.
The Moltke Ridge Wind Farm picked up the payments in 2021 and has been back paying landowners since then – completing a recent payment last week. Norden said they have been making quarterly payments totaling $300,000 a year.
“We know that money doesn’t just stay in someone’s sofa, they spend it back,” he said.
He continued by noting how Lotus understands the landowner aspect, so they allow Norden to take funds and bring them back to areas that are in need.
The reason why Norden hasn’t been in front of the commissioners sooner is because he said he is still trying to get a feeling for the state since he has been commuting 5 hours from Ohio.
He discussed how he has developed two wind farms in Ohio. One of them being Northwest Ohio Wind Farm with $900,000 of yearly tax funds. The other, Grove Hill Wind Farm with $1.3 million of tax money for 140 megawatts.
“There is a tax benefit for it,” Norden said. “And I know not everybody is not for these wind farms … My job here is trying to describe the best benefits for it, keep everybody informed.
“I mean, if there is something bad about them, if these things were causing health problems I wouldn’t be here right now.”
When asked what the completion date is for the project, Norden said it might start at the end of 2025, but “in reality it’s a 2026 project right now.”
There are several factors that still need to go into the project such as getting permits and transformers for the turbines which require a 102-week period to set up. Additionally, Lotus does not yet have a buyer for the power or commitments to companies for distribution.
Norden said they have had tech companies and utilities reach out, which he could not disclose, but is looking at local utilities to sign an agreement for power.
“Because there are upgrade fees you have on MISO (energy), which are very expensive,” he said. “And while local utilities or in state utilities are signed up with the power … those upgrades you pay for actually come back and you don’t have to pay them. They’re rebated somehow.”
Some of the worries Norden has been road agreements, permits and distribution.
“The distribution is the hard part…” he said. “These things are hard to build, this is not a guarantee something is going to be built.
“If this thing doesn’t go through in four years or something fails, at least I got the community or the landowner’s money until that time that signed up to try and keep things going as much as we can.”
Participation agreements are offered by Lotus to landowners. Norden said the lease by acre is a $10 rate. Therefore, when someone with one acre participates, they would receive the same payment as someone with 100 acres. However, they most likely would not have anything on their property, but it will pay their taxes and insurance.
Norden concluded the contract would be a 30 year and two 10-year extensions.
“This project will probably cost anywhere, depending on the megawatts, probably 250 million dollars to build,” he said. “When you got that much money out there you need that long term commitment to get that money back.”
One of the commissioners asked if the project does move forward and the wind turbines are up, is there any mention in the contract about how landowners could go about taking them down. Norden responded with, “yes, there is a bond.”
He said the de-commissioning bond will be enough for every turbine to come down if another company didn’t try to buy it and set it back up.
“That’s what they have in Ohio as well since you can’t just leave turbines around not doing anything,” Norden said.
When looking at power purchase agreements, Norden discussed a line that was put up off M-68 that is apart of his proposal, which is not finalized yet. There were mentions of it being owned currently by a local apple farmer.
Norden briefly mentioned the FAA letter with the Rogers City Airport when going over the map of restricted areas in his proposal, the airport being one of them.
Lotus Infrastructure usually gets its turbines from General Electric which is manufactured in South Carolina. The company would be bringing in 53 turbines with 4.5 megawatts.
“Two years from now it (megawattage) may be something different because they become more efficient every year,” he said.
It can be expected that the turbines would be as tall as 550-665 feet. Norden said this would include around 850 yards of concrete for the wind turbines to be built on a four-foot slab to allow easy removal when they are de-commissioned.
In accordance with forestry guidelines, there would also be a 250 feet distance required between the wind turbines and any forest lot of five acres, Norden said. There were previous worries about lines cutting through the forests, but he said that would not be a concern.
The contractor for this project would most likely be IEA Infrastructure, Norden said. But they would try to hire as many local union workers as possible.
“Whatever I can get local here, we try.”
As for jobs working on the wind turbines themselves, Norden said this would offer 8-9 technician jobs.
He made the comparison of a factory allowing for over 2,000 jobs, but the base of the tax revenue with the wind turbines is much different. Norden said the tax base is still there even when there are no people.
If construction started there would be about 200 people for nine months working on the concrete and assembling of the turbines. Norden said with his work in Paulding County in Ohio, he saw a 175% difference in the community’s economy with the hotels being completely booked with construction workers.
Besides the construction of the wind turbines, there is also possibilities of access roads being built under the production tax credit.
“In the production tax credit, you have to show 2% advancements in the project every year, which could be buying a transformer, or buying turbines instead of the roads,” he said. “The roads are the cheaper options which you may or may not see here.”
There is already a basic layout of what Lotus Infrastructure is planning on for the project, but there has yet to be any finalized plans on the access roads or collection lines.
Norden said all of these aspects for the project were based on the ordinance the board of commissioners issued in 2018 about the wind farms setbacks.
The lease is completely the same as the previous company. The only difference, Norden said, is a document stating that Star Ridge is now Moltke Ridge, which was finalized in August of 2021.
So far, Norden said there have been MET towers build in Moltke township to monitor the wind for the past year. It was concluded that Moltke has “great wind data.”
“We think there is a viable project here,” Norden said.
In the second week of August, Norden mentioned he would be meeting with Moltke Ridge township trustees to let them know what is going on with the project as well.
As of right now, the meeting with the Presque Isle County Board of Commissioners was to simply listen to Norden’s proposal and ask questions. There has not been a decision on the Moltke Ridge Wind Farm project.