Wind Energy Keeps Iowa Power Costs Low

Wind energy accounts for up to 20 percent of Iowa’s total electricity production, and is helping maintain the state’s low energy costs, according to a recent article. A recent study holds Iowa up as a prime example of how alternative energy and other measures to combat climate change can be accomplished affordably.

The study was conducted by the Iowa Policy Project (IPP), a nonpartisan, nonprofit research organization based in Iowa City. IPP researcher and co-author of the study David Osterberg points out that Iowa’s example proves that action can be taken on climate change: “Those people who tell us we can't do anything about global climate change because it will be too expensive are wrong, Iowa is proving it wrong.

According to the study, wind power produced 3,670 megawatts of electricity in the state, enough power to run 940,000 homes. This makes Iowa the second-largest wind producing state in the country, after Texas. If the power were used solely within the state’s confines, three quarters of the state’s homes could run on wind.

The state’s unique combination of weather and geography play in its favor: nearly three quarters of the state consistently has enough wind at 80 meters above the ground to reliably produce wind energy.

At the moment, coal-powered plants produce about 75 percent of the state’s electricity, and there is one nuclear plant in the state, the article said.

The study found that Iowans paid about 6 cents per kilowatt hour in 1998, climbing to to 7 cents per kilowatt hour by 2008. Over the same time period, national average electricity costs went from 7 cents per kilowatt hour to nearly 10 cents.  “Amidst Iowa's massive expansion of wind power, our average electricity prices have remained below the national average and in fact have not increased as quickly as the national average price in the last four years,” the study’s authors noted.

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Chris Timmerman
Contributing Writer
Green Education Services
www.greenedu.com