The newly formed South Dakota Wind Energy Association has commissioned a study into the feasibility of developing projects that would sell wind-generated electricity to Minnesota, association officials said.
Board President Jeff Nelson said the study will evaluate the benefits and challenges of developing 1,000 megawatts of wind power in eastern South Dakota. That electricity could be sold to Minnesota utilities so they could meet that state’s standards for renewable energy, he said.
The project would be a test of South Dakota’s ability to develop more wind farms that could sell power to distant markets, Nelson said at the association’s first membership meeting.
South Dakota is considered to have the fourth best wind potential among the states, but it lacks access to enough transmission lines to get wind energy to markets in large cities.
Peak demand for all of South Dakota is just 3,000 megawatts an hour, Nelson said. The state has wind farms that generate about 300 megawatts, and it will be producing about 700 megawatts by 2011, he said. One megawatt of wind power will supply electricity to 250-300 average homes.
South Dakota could reasonably develop enough wind projects to generate 8,000 megawatts of electricity, which would have a $9 billion economic impact and create about 4,000 long-term jobs, he said. (AP)
