Forum explores wind as local power source

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When Lee Schreiner bought a dilapidated building in downtown Rockford, he wanted to not only bring about an urban renewal, but do it in a way that used green technologies.

The high school physics teacher now runs a ministry center and fair-trade store using an 18-foot wind turbine on the roof of the building.

Schreiner was invited by the DeKalb Citizen’s Environmental Commission to share how he harnessed wind in the middle of a big city. The Environmental Commission hosted a wind energy forum Wednesday night at the DeKalb Municipal Building.

The idea for hosting an educational session on wind energy sprang from the possibility of more than 130 wind turbines spinning their way into DeKalb County, Environmental Commission Chairman Bill Finucane said. But the commission did not purposely schedule the forum the night before a public hearing will be held on a proposed wind farm in southern parts of the county.

The environmental group hosted the forum in front of about 20 people to give the public information on the hot topic, but has not made a stance on wind as a viable energy source, Finucane said.

“We’re always trying to find ways to reduce emissions from petroleum- or coal-generated energy,” he said. “This seems to be one of the ways. There’s not any one way that’s going to be the panacea for all emissions reductions.”

Also speaking at the forum was David Goldblum, a Northern Illinois University assistant geography professor, who said that though wind is the fastest-growing energy source in the world, all costs – including external costs like bird mortality, aesthetics and adjacent property values – need to be considered.

And right now, he said, very few studies have been conducted on whether property values are affected by wind turbines. This could change as the industry grows.

“I think we’re probably at the beginning of a paradigm shift,” Goldblum said. “It’s kind of the awkward beginning of all this.”

The third speaker at Wednesday’s forum, Leonard Salvig, knows all about awkward beginnings.

Salvig, of Garden Prairie-based Hybrid Renewables Inc., led the installation of Schreiner’s rooftop turbine. He said that particular turbine, which spins on a vertical axis, was the first in the state, and that they ran into unforeseeable problems “every step of the way.”

During the second part of the forum, some audience members asked questions relating to the feasibility of small wind turbines in residential areas. While Schreiner said that one of the first steps was persuading the city of Rockford to agree to the project, the advantage was that city officials were “completely baffled at what to do.”

DeKalb is much like Rockford in that way, explained DeKalb’s special projects coordinator Jamie Smirz.

There aren’t ordinances that say ‘yes’ to wind turbines, she said, but there aren’t ordinances saying ‘no’ either. If a DeKalb resident wanted to build a turbine similar to Schreiner’s rooftop tower, he or she would most likely need a special use permit, Smirz said.