Utility plans to shut off turbine lights

MARENGO — MidAmerican Energy Company is addressing the biggest complaint it gets about its wind farms: the constant flashing red lights.

John Huff, MidAmerican project outreach manager, explained to Iowa County Supervisors last week a plan to erect an aircraft detection lighting system tower in the Diamond Trail Wind Project near Victor and Ladora in Iowa County.

The detection system will keep the flashing red lights turned off until they are needed to alert aircraft of the presence of the turbines.

“This would be on the south edge of Diamond Trail,” said Huff.

One tower will cover the entire wind farm, said Mackenzie Foster, customer project coordinator.

The tower will be about 100 feet tall and will detect aircraft within a three-mile radius, said Huff. The lights will come on only when the radar detects an aircraft. The lights won’t be affected by commercial jets, he said.

The radar will detect anything flying below 1,500 feet, said Mike Griglione, renewable project engineering specialist. That includes crop dusters and drones.

With the installation of the radar, MidAmerican will be able to keep the flashing red lights off 90-95% of the time, Griglione said.

“We have one built right now out by Adair,” said Griglione. That tower covers three wind projects.

MidAmerican has eight more towers in the planning stage, the representatives said.

The company tried to find a way to include the Poweshiek County wind turbines in the radius of the Iowa County tower, said Foster, but a tower covering the entire area would be too tall, she said.

The free-standing, latticed tower will have three legs, a crow’s nest and a radar that spins, said Griglione. It will look like a cell tower. The company wants to put the tower on the same property as the collection line.

MidAmerican’s attorney, Lee Greenwald, told Supervisors that the company wanted to inform the Iowa County Board of Supervisors of its plan and find out who the company should keep in touch with to make sure it follows all of the county’s zoning ordinances.

MidAmerican should go through the Supervisors, said Supervisor Chairman Kevin Heitshusen.

MidAmerican plans to have the tower operational by the end of the years, said Foster. That completion date is contingent on getting FAA and FCC licenses.

The company has to get FCC approval to make sure the tower doesn’t interfere with any communications, its representatives said.