Yes, we're rural, but it's a lot more than that. We're in the Southwest Power Pool (SPP), which encompasses parts of 17 states. See the red area below.
Decisions made in the SPP are outside the scope of a lot of individual state actions.
In Kansas, we have the Kansas Corporation Commission (KCC) that makes a lot of the decisions, such as whether to approve a new wind farm.
The KCC is under the gun because SPP rules allocate the cost of transmission lines based on their load size. Most wind farms require relatively minimal lines to reach the grid, so those costs are passed on to ratepayer in a smaller local region.
Currently, for about the last six years actually, Kansas has been making more wind energy than can be used because the grid doesn't accommodate it. They say the energy is "bottle necked."
So, we really don't need any more wind farms here, but a few years ago something else happened -- KCPL and Westar (two major Kansas utilities) merged into "Evergy" and went public. An aggressive hedge fund manager--Elliot Management--bought a large amount of stock in Evergy and has been pushing it to build more and more wind farms in Kansas. Elliot has had Evergy people fired and they've threatened to have the company sold. It was obviously a big mistake for Evergy to go public, but they did.
Evergy has become a snake and not because the people who work there are bad, but because Elliot is relentless.
My rural electric co-op buys power from Evergy and then tacks on their own operational fees. So, I'm in a high cost district. Still, my costs are not as high as other areas in Kansas.
I've submitted testimony for the past four years straight when the Kansas legislature has been in session. I've spoken many times to one member of the KCC who is trying to iron this out.
We need for the wind farms to stop. Just completely stop developing in Kansas. But, they won't. They pressure local commissions, threaten to sue them, and what makes it so bad is that they're hurting us while using our own taxpayer dollars to do it. Tens of thousands of people have joined anti-wind groups across the state, and we typically help small groups fund their legal fees, but EDF, NextEra, and others are paying their attorneys with taxpayer money. The way the wind companies are funded is outrageous but that's a story for another day.
LOL
See--you shouldn't get me going on this.
At any rate, we have local and state groups that have formed to help people who simply can't pay their electric bills, but it's a band-aid on a severed limb. We have to get some true relief and that can only come from legislation that stops the wind companies from running roughshod over us.
Big money moves beneath the surface with these companies. The energy industry has always had its share of corruption--and sometimes even organized crime--and now the wind companies are taking their place in that game.
I dunno. It's a bigger fight than most know and I've been fighting it for years now. Now, we're fighting against greenies who don't have a clue as to how many people they're hurting. They mean well, but they're inundated in the Eco-fantastic idea of renewable energy.
Oh well, that's my morning rant. I'm off to work...