Courtesy of Planet Forward comes this video about how farming the wind has turned around Roscoe, Texas (and rural communities in many parts of the ‘wind belt’).
Roping the wind in Texas from Powering a Nation on Vimeo.
Farmer Cliff Etheredge provides his perspective on the community’s change with wind development.
It’s a 180-degree attitude change in our culture around here cause we’ve always cussed the wind. The wind had been so terrible, so hard on our crops, we’re now able to sell the wind. We don’t own the wind, we owned the rights to the wind and it costs nothing.
And, unlike oil and gas, we’ve got an endless supply.
A tangible example of the realities of how clean energy developments changed a community for the better.
Our horizons have changed.
The windmills aren’t only generating electricity and making money and doing all those green things, they’re a symbol of progress. An effort to clean up our act. … really the feeling that maybe we did something right.
2 responses so far ↓
1 LaughingPlanet // Jan 8, 2010 at 3:46 pm
Great vid.
Love the drawl and the all-American faces. Makes regular folk realize that it’s patriotic to support wind power instead of just “Drill, baby, drill”.
2 Alarmjaguar // Jan 10, 2010 at 11:18 am
That was inspiring. Thank you. I think I’ve driven past those fields (or another wind field in Tx). I’m always struck by their beauty — which is probably influenced by the hope they represent for the environment and American jobs.