Cohen reported in early October 2024 that lightning has struck the 2 turbines on the farm 3 times.
Teresa Weets and her daughter, Sally Freeman, look June 11 at a burned wind
turbine on their family farm near Mechanicsville, Iowa. Another turbine caught
fire in August, adding to the debris field Freeman estimates at 240 acres or more.
The family still is waiting for Acciona North America, the turbine manufacturer,
to finish cleaning up the debris. (Savannah Blake/The Gazette)
On Aug. 15, Sally Freeman received a call from a neighbor.
“Your wind turbine’s on fire again,” the neighbor said in the 5 a.m. call.
By the time Freeman looked out her window at the family farm near Mechanicsville, Iowa, most of the turbine blade already had burned. Her parents, Steve and Teresa Weets, agreed in 2012 to an easement with Acciona Wind Power to install two turbines on the family farm in Cedar County. But within the last 18 months, both turbines have been struck by lightning — and now, one of them twice. The strikes left fiberglass, dust and other debris strewn over at least 240 acres, almost a third of the farm’s land. And with the fall harvest underway, the family’s frustration with having the damaged turbines removed and the debris cleaned up is threatening their bottom line.
“We're trying to figure out what's going to happen to that corn,” said Freeman, 31. “We don't know if it's going to have to end up in a landfill, or if there is some type of place to go salvage it, or a different market to put it into. I hate to have to haul that much corn to the landfill, especially a year like this year where we're looking at really good yields.”
Explosives or crane?
After the landowners waited for months, the wind power company removed the foundation of the first turbine. An Acciona North America spokesperson said that first turbine struck was a metal tower, which is easier to remove from the farm. He said “conversations are underway” with the landowners on how to remove the second foundation.
“That's going to help us determine what the next steps are and how to dismantle that tower,” the spokesperson said. But removing that tower is more complicated because it’s made of concrete — not metal.
“It makes the removal a bit more complex. So that's something we're looking into to figure out,” the spokesperson said. “... How we do this in a safe manner that both our employees and our contractors do it in a way that is also satisfactory to the landowners?”
A wind turbine on a Cedar County farm now has been struck by lightning twice.
In all, two turbines on the farm were struck a total of three times in the last 18 months.
(Supplied photo).
Freeman said her family repeatedly has requested Acciona use a crane to remove the second tower — rather than explosives to knock it over, due to concerns that explosives will lead to more debris. But Freeman said Acciona has refused, saying that using a crane isn’t safe. Acciona, headquartered in Spain, has operations in North America, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Oceania.
The Acciona manufacturing plant in West Branch ceased operations in 2013 and was later bought by the Nordex Group, a Germany-based global wind turbine manufacturer. Nordex aims to restart production of turbines there in 2025.
A large hole where a turbine propeller hit the ground is littered with fiberglass
and gasoline June 11 on the Weets’ farmland near Mechanicsville, Iowa.
The turbine was struck by lightning and caught fire, causing one of the
propellers to fall. (Savannah Blake/The Gazette)
Worried about contaminated corn
The scattered debris on the farm has become more embedded in the corn as time goes on, leading to questions on how the harvest will unfold to avoid potential contamination and damage to farm equipment.
“It's interspersed within the cornfield, stuck on top of the corn plants in places,” Freeman said.
Freeman said it is hard to tell where the debris stops, due to how tall the corn is, but estimated “at least” 240 acres have been affected because wind has scattered the debris. Although “the bulk” of the debris is on her parents’ farm, some fiberglass and other materials made it onto a neighbor’s property and into a creek, Freeman said.
She said how they will approach the harvest is being worked out with Acciona. But the current plan is to try to harvest what they can of the affected corn, then use a grain bagger to store it — keeping it separate from the normal grain system to avoid contaminating the other corn and any potential issues that could pop up by putting the contaminated grain through other machinery.
Freeman said Acciona earlier sent a third-party cleanup crew to the farm to assist with removing the debris, but Acciona would not confirm what company is doing the cleanup. Despite the work on the property since early June, Freeman said much of the debris remains. Freeman said she doesn’t want another landowner to have to endure the frustration and uncertainty the family has gone through.
Linn County requires cleanup bond
Linn County Supervisor Kirsten Running-Marquardt visited the Cedar County farm after hearing about the damage, as Linn County was in the midst of developing its own wind turbine ordinance. She said the damage to the farm was worse than she anticipated. Since she visited the farm, Linn County passed a wind ordinance including having a requirement that a wind power company post a bond for cleanup efforts.
Running-Marquardt said other county ordinances have bonds for decommissioning wind turbines, but not for cleanup efforts.
“We had included the separate bond piece, which was critical, we thought, moving forward in order to protect folks,” Running-Marquardt said. “So we have on the front end that the company has to have a bond for cleanup.”
Running-Marquardt said other counties have asked for Linn County’s ordinance “several times” in an attempt to adopt similar language for theirs.
“We could do nothing for (the family) but we could take what we learned and apply it to our wind policy for Linn County,” Running-Marquardt said. “I’m proud we included regular maintenance specifically on grounding mechanisms, better company contact information for the resident in case the company changes hands, good neighbor policies and most importantly, the company has to provide a separate bond for cleanup on top of a decommissioning bond.”
Jason Ryan, deputy director of media relations for the American Clean Power Association, said there is no blanket policy that wind turbine manufacturers follow when it comes to cleanup policies and procedures.
“The removal and remediation of wind turbines are typically outlined in the lease agreements between operators and landowners. Industry best practices include conducting a comprehensive site assessment to evaluate structural integrity and identify any potential hazards,” Ryan said in a statement to The Gazette. “This ensures that the removal process is carried out safely and efficiently, while also prioritizing effective site remediation.”
In Cedar County’s wind ordinance, there currently is only minimal language that discusses cleanup procedures.
In the ordinance’s “waste disposal” clause, it says that “solid and hazardous wastes, including but not limited to crates, packaging materials, damaged or worn parts, as well as used oils and lubricants, shall be removed from the site in a time period as established by the Cedar County Environmental Health Department and disposed of in accordance with all applicable local, state and federal regulations.”
Lightning strikes — but not fires — common
Corey Markfort, an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Iowa, said it isn’t uncommon for wind turbines to be struck by lightning. But it is less typical for a strike to lead to a fire.
“Wind turbines have lightning suppression systems integrated into them,” Markfort said. “Even though lightning strikes are common (and) may do some damage, but catastrophic damage is more rare.”
Markfort said wind turbines have a “lightning rod” in the nacelle, which sits at the top of a turbine to house the technology that converts wind energy into electricity. He said that lightning rod helps protect the turbine, but not necessarily the blades themselves. Markfort said typical wind turbines have a life span of 20 to 30 years, but that the science of wind energy has developed quickly throughout the last decade and there has been “a lot of evolution” in the industry.
Before signing an easement agreement, Ryan — of the American Clean Power Association — said landowners should understand the implications of having turbines on their property.
“Landowners should thoroughly understand the terms of the easement agreement, including the duration, financial compensation, decommissioning commitments, and scope of the acres being committed and access for the developer and landowner,” Ryan said in a statement to The Gazette. “Landowners can typically farm on their land close to the turbines.”
Ryan added that landowners who host one or more wind turbines can realize “tens of thousands” of dollars of income each year.
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