Final stages

Construction of the county’s second wind farm has hit the home stretch.

Bitter Ridge Wind Farm, which has been in the works for more than two and a half years, is in the final stages of construction after the final turbine went up in late July.

Pete Endres, project developer for Colorado-based Scout Clean Energy, explained this week that construction crews are finishing up work on the energy collection system, which predominantly involves underground cables. Testing for the $135 million project will follow.

Baltimore-based Constellation, a subsidiary of Excelon Corporation, previously committed to buy 80 percent of the power generated by the 130-megawatt facility.

“We have to go through the final steps of what’s called commissioning, which is basically all the final mechanical and electrical testing,” said Endres, adding that everything should be complete by about mid-September. “Once that’s complete, the project, we expect, can go online.”

Initial work toward the project — construction of access roads and turbine bases — began in 2019. The first test loads were delivered April 17, with major turbine components following the next week.

Lead contractor M.A. Mortenson of Minneapolis put up the last of the 52 turbines (2.82 megawatts each) — the hubs are at 292 feet and the blades reach to about 500 feet fully extended — that make up the facility on July 22. It is on track to go online this fall as planned despite the impact of the coronavirus pandemic and other challenges.

A heavy rain this spring left the area of the farm — it is bordered by county roads 400 South, 250 West, 1100 West and the Jay-Randolph county line — unworkable for about five days. The pandemic impacted both on-site construction, forcing new procedures such as limited contact between workers, and the supply chain.

And demonstrations in support of the Black Lives Matter movement at times limited the availability of state police to escort the delivery of the large wind farm components.

“We had some very significant challenges, but we’ve managed all of them,” said Endres. “That’s kudos to our construction team and Mortenson as well as all of the suppliers working on the project. We’ve been able to keep it on schedule.”

As construction is completed, crews will also be removing turning radiuses that were put in to allow component delivery. Then, attention will turn to paving the roads that were used during the process. (A road use agreement in place between the county and Scout requires the company to restore the roads to as good or better than their original condition once construction is complete.)

Paving is slated to begin in October, Endres said, with completion by the end of 2020, weather permitting.

“I want all the roads paved before winter,” said Jay County engineer Dan Watson.

Typically, a celebration would accompany such a project going online. Because of the pandemic, that event will have to wait.

“We were planning that for this fall, and we had every intent to do that this fall, but due to COVID we don’t really feel it’s appropriate and safe to do that,” said Endres. “And so we’re delaying that … Hopefully we can do it next spring.”

Scout first began meeting with local officials in late 2017, about the same time NextEra Energy’s Bluff Point Wind Energy Center went online in southern Jay County and northern Randolph County. That project had been in the works since 2006.

Bitter Ridge faced opposition from local group STOP Jay County Wind Farms but was eventually earned approval for its plans from Jay County Plan Commission and a 10-year tax abatement from Jay County Council. (As a result of the opposition, a temporary moratorium on wind farms was put in place to allow a review of the county’s ordinance. Updated regulations were approved, and the moratorium lifted, in December.)

Scout recently made the second of its four annual $390,000 payments as part of the economic development agreement it made with the county. The company is expected to pay about $13.7 million in taxes over the 25-year life of the facility, with lease payments to landowners to come in at about $13 million.

Though he hasn’t been able to visit Jay County recently because of the pandemic, Endres said he’s looking forward to seeing Bitter Ridge come to fruition.

“As a developer … you talk about these projects in their concepts,” he said. “Now that we’re able to bring this project to a close … it’s just very exciting.”

Scout recently completed Heart of Texas wind farm in central Texas and hopes to move forward soon on Gonzaga Ridge Wind Farm, a project that involves replacing existing 1980s turbines with new technology. The company is also working on several wind farm developments in Illinois.

Endres also noted that Scout has an interest in developing a solar farm in Jay County.­