GRATIOT COUNTY-Gratiot County will be home to Michigan's largest wind energy plant. Officials with Invenergy Wind in Chicago and Gratiot Count Wind LLC said the over 30,000 acre wind farm will power close to 54,000 homes
Invenergy Public Relations Spokesperson Kevin Parzyck said the new facility will have immediate and long term economic benefits.
Parzyck said the construction of the facility will hire 150 workers as well as create15 high technology jobs to maintain the facility once it is built.
"Most significantly is the millions of dollars that will be paid on an annual basis both to the landowners that host the facilities as well as payments in local property taxes that will be paid to the township and the schools in Gratiot County," Parzyck said.
Parzyck said they chose Gratiot County because the community is open to the idea of renewable energy and there is strong leadership in the area to support the facility.
One of the main reasons they picked Gratiot is because it has what Parzyck calls "Good Wind."
"You basically have good wind speeds and a consistent wind," said Parzyck. "So what we've done over the past several years is install meteorological towers that measure the wind through spring, summer, winter, night, and see whether we can get good power out of those wind speeds."
The facility will be operational by next year.