WIND BOOM ON MEXICO ISTHMUS TEMPESTUOUS

Clean-energy windmills a 'dirty business' for farmers in Mexico
Chris Hawley, June 17, 2009 (USA Today)

SUMMARY
Mexico's Isthmus of Tehuantepec, a stretch of land between the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean, may be the windiest terrain in the world, blowing at average annual speeds above the rating of excellent.

Mexican President Felipe Calderón’s government wants to build 2,500 megawatts of wind capacity by the end of 2012 (3 years).

Mexico began studying and mapping wind in the 1990s. Building started booming after the election of Calderon. A former Energy Minister, President Calderon saw Mexico’s once colossal oil reserves peaking and pushed legal arrangements to bring in private money the government did not and does not have to develop New Energy.

The isthmus. (click to enlarge)

Towns in the isthmus are riding the resultant boom. U.S. and EU wind engineers are spending money in the restaurants and hotels of Juchitán. In La Ventosa ("the windy place"), a government study center is busily developing new turbine technology. Trucks are everywhere all the time, hauling the stuff of wind energy (cement, steel, tower cans, turbine blades, nacelle parts and manual laborers).

Wind producers are working fast but the impacts are not being effectively mitigated. There are complaints of destruction of agricultural irrigation canals, interruptions in pasturelands and the burying of crops in dust and construction debris.

Perhaps worse, farmers are complaining of being taken advantage of with complicated lease deals. Land that would support ranching and farming worth much more is being leased at $46 an acre.

A new wind installation on the isthmus allowing dual use. (click to enlarge)

Endesa, a Spanish wind developer, offered isthmus landowners leases for 1.4% of the profit, plus $300 a year for each tower, an additional $4.60 per acre per year, $182 per acre of land damaged by construction and a signing bonus of $37. Farmers were required to obtain permission from turbine owners before transferring or developing their property

In Iowa, wind developers lease farmland for $3,000-to-$5,000 a year and are required to deal with fewer attached "strings."

Adding insult to injury, the wind power-generated electricity is not going to the Oaxacan locals but to big businesses like WalMart and industrial customers like Cemex cement plants.

Worst of all, from the point of view of President Calderon’s political opponents, the Mexican energy sector – in the hands of the government since the oil industry was nationalized in the 1930s – could be taken over by the capitalist entrepreneurs who are investing in wind and other New Energies.

Chart from an April 2008 EWEC presentation by Soren Krohn. (click to enlarge)

COMMENTARY
The Isthmus of Tehuantepec, 330 miles southeast of Mexico City, is a 130-mile wide funnel-bottom formed by two mountain ranges where wind from the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico sails through to the Pacific Ocean.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) rates average annual wind speeds of 14.9 mph at good, 16.3 mph at excellent and Isthmus of Tehuantepec wind speeds at above 19 mph.

Winter wind gusts near La Venta flip tractor-trailer trucks.

During the Calderon years, high oil prices made wind a better buy and wind technology has made wind-generated electricity more affordable. Example: Clipper Windpower is presently installing 27 2.5-megawatt turbines on the isthmus.

click to enlarge

The wind industry has made every effort in the U.S., most of the time, to do the right thing the right way. Sadly, it does not seem to be making the same effort in Mexico. Some crews have built unnecessarily wide gravel roads, hammered in pylons, poured 1,200 tons of tower concrete and dumped huge loads of gravel onto sorghum fields and grazing land. One farmer had 2 roads cut into his 16-acre pasture and, with land turned useless by dust and blocked irrigation, had to reduce his herd from 30 to 10 cows.

Some companies pay 50 cents to $1 per square yard per year for damaged land and promise to reverse the harm but ~180 farmers in the towns of Xadani, Union Hildago and Juchitán didn’t want to hear it. They sued Endesa, Preneal and Union Fenosa, accusing them of misleading information and deceptions. They won. Wind lost. Hostility grew.

San Mateo del Mar Huavé Indians voted to keep out developers. It re-ignited territorial disputes with neighboring Zapotec Indian villages and added to the hostile atmosphere for wind development. The Catholic Archdiocese has turned against developers. Political tensions have also flared.

Nationally, Calderon’s opponents say he is trying to privatize the energy industry. Hundreds came out to protest the Presidente's recent personal appearance at a wind project launching.

click to enlarge

The tempestuousness and turmoil is slowing New Energy development. Demonstrations in La Venta have stopped construction 6 times at Acciona Energy’s Eurus wind project.

The companies claim they are being fair and remunerations are climbing. Acciona is now paying $186 per acre per year plus 80 cents per square yard of damaged land at its 167-turbine Eurus project. Union Fenosa has promised 1% of the profit from its Juchitán project plus 0.3% more for landowners with turbines on their property.

Fortunately for Mexico’s energy future, not everyone is yet alienated by the irresponsibility of a few greedy and impatient New Energy developers. Some locals have benefited and say so. A La Venta farmer used Acciona’s first lease payment on his 10-acres to buy a used bus and negotiated a contract to shuttle workers to construction sites. Another opened an auto-parts store and is doing well selling parts for all those trucks. A 76-year-old town man is earning a veritably princely $26 per day directing truck traffic.

Some locals, nevertheless, are farsighted enough to wonder if the good times will last after construction is completed.

From the way wind developers seem to disdain respect for the land and the locals, they are not so farsighted.

Chart from an April 2008 EWEC presentation by Soren Krohn. (click to enlarge)

QUOTES
- Martin Pasqualetti, New Energy expert, Arizona State University: "This is one of the finest wind areas in the world, and they are being very ambitious about developing it…They're trying to do in five years what California took 35 years to do."
- Alejo Giron, communal farmer, La Venta: "It has divided neighbors against each other…If this place has so much possibility, where are the benefits for us?"
- Felipe Calderon, President of Mexico: "With nothing but wind power, without burning a drop of petroleum, we are generating electricity so people can live better, so companies can produce more and generate more jobs, and so that people here can benefit through rent or association with these projects…"
- Abel Sánchezm, farmer, Santa María Xadani, describing theloud speaker-equipped truck drumming up lease deals with farmers: "It went around saying there was going to be a program to help farmers, and that we should show up the next night for a meeting…"
- Salvador Ordaz, farmer: "When you think of windmills, you just think of this one tower…But it affects a lot more land than that."

Chart from an April 2008 EWEC presentation by Soren Krohn. (click to enlarge)

- Pasqualetti: "The evidence would indicate (Mexican landowners) are not getting what they should be getting…"
- Claudia Vera, lawyer, Tepeyac Human Rights Center: "It's clean energy but dirty business…"
- Protests to wind development: "Get out, Wilson! … La Venta belongs to the ejido members! … No to the robbery of our territory! No to the wind power projects!"
- Ignacio Querol, project manager, Eurus: "The truth is, if the people felt that what we're paying wasn't fair, we wouldn't be here…"
- Cruz Velázquez, landowner getting lease payments/auto-parts store owner, Oaxaca: "It's done good things for us…Even people who were in the United States are coming back here to work because of it."
- Giron: "People are not thinking about the long term…Those generators will be making millions of dollars for the company, and they will be limiting what you can do with your land for 30, 40 years. Soon, whatever they're paying won't seem like very much money anymore."