Here & Now

Chelsea Chandler on Expanding Renewable Energy in Wisconsin

Frederica Freyberg:
Plans are spinning into motion for a large wind turbine project, the first of its size to be approved since 2011 by the state Public Service Commission. The Badger Hollow Wind Project, with 19 turbines, will complement the state’s largest solar project by the same name in Iowa County. The PSC at the same time approved a solar project in Whitewater. This as the federal government cuts $7.5 billion from green energy projects in several states recently, not including Wisconsin yet. Against that backdrop, renewable energy advocates consider the latest approvals in Wisconsin a major win. We spoke earlier with Chelsea Chandler from Clean Wisconsin for more. How big of a win are these PSC approvals for clean energy in Wisconsin?

Chelsea Chandler:
Yeah, it’s really notable that Badger Hollow is the first wind project to be approved in over 14 years. That’s really significant. We know that we need a lot more wind energy, solar energy to meet our energy needs and to do so in a clean way. Solar and wind are the cheapest forms of electricity, so it’s a really great win for people’s pocketbooks, for our electricity bills. And these also really represent huge opportunities for rural communities in terms of the economics and the money that is flowing into the host communities, from the farmers who signed leases to host these, where they get this long term, stable, high income, which is helping them kind of weather these ups and downs with tariff wars and everything like that in commodity crops right now. And it’s a big win for communities too, who get annual payments for hosting these projects. And so they can use that money to do things like fix roads or lower taxes or just whatever the local leaders deem is the highest and best use. So it’s great.

Frederica Freyberg:
So the 19 turbines at the Badger Hollow project approved, how much energy does that produce?

Chelsea Chandler:
It’s enough to power tens of thousands of Wisconsin homes. Wind energy is very efficient. One minute of a wind turbine spinning can power a Wisconsin home for an entire day. So we’re generating huge amounts of energy from those turbines.

Frederica Freyberg:
How does wind work with solar? Is that a complimentary kind of mix?

Chelsea Chandler:
Very much so. Increasingly we’re seeing projects be proposed along with storage like batteries. And so that can also help store when there’s a lot of wind or, you know, a really sunny day store that energy away for some of those times where we’ve got less of those resources. They work well seasonally together as well. So there’s less sun in the winter, although the panels themselves are very efficient in cold temperatures, but wind is actually more productive in the winter too, because the colder air is denser and it helps generate more electricity. So they really do pair well together.

Frederica Freyberg:
We just did an interview about the amount of energy new data centers are going to require. How will this portfolio of clean energy help boost that capacity?

Chelsea Chandler:
You know, any additional electricity that’s coming online is going to be helpful. But these data centers are really representing a massive, massive energy demand. It’s kind of hard to wrap our minds around them, frankly. Clean Wisconsin just did an analysis that showed that just for a couple of data centers that did report their energy use, they would use as much energy or more energy than all of the homes in Wisconsin combined. So it’s really staggering. We’re haven’t been seeing renewables powering these data centers yet. What we’re seeing is more gas plants being proposed. That’s what happened when WE Energies territory, a couple of gas plants were approved to support the Microsoft Data Center. We’re seeing a renewed interest in nuclear. I will say there’s a misalignment in the timeline of when we have this energy demand from the data centers and how long it takes to build those projects. Solar and wind are actually the fastest. They take maybe 1 or 2 years to build. Gas is more like five, and nuclear, you’re looking at a decade or more. So it’s, it’s a really tough proposition but, you know, every bit counts.

Frederica Freyberg:
Chelsea Chandler, Clean Wisconsin, thanks very much.

Chelsea Chandler:
Thank you.