Are more wind turbines on the way? Five weather towers go before the county soon

Wind companies will ask the Blackford County Area Board of Zoning Appeals for permission to build as many as five weather-measuring towers at two hearings next week. Where two of them would stand raises a question for county residents: is the Prairie Creek wind project planning to grow?

Two Prairie Creek Wind companies go first. The board meets at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 17, on the first floor of the Blackford County Courthouse to hear their petitions for two 394-foot towers. Each asks for a special exception to build "a public utility structure consisting of one (1) meteorological tower (MET Tower)," according to legal notices signed by BZA Secretary Samantha Dick.

Prairie Creek Wind Farm, LLC of Chicago filed for a tower near 6720 N 350 W, north of Hartford City in Washington Township. Prairie Creek Wind Farm II, LLC filed for a tower near 3754 W 200 S, southwest of town in Licking Township. RWE, a German energy company, is the developer behind both.

Teays River Wind Farm LLC of Houston, the company behind EDP Renewables' wind project on the county's east side, goes two days later. At 7 p.m. Nov. 19, in the Circuit Courtroom on the courthouse's third floor, the board will hear its petition for a special exception covering its commercial wind project and up to three meteorological towers, plus a variance allowing an additional one-year extension to the special exception. That notice lists 39 parcels stretching from around State Road 26 north to the Montpelier and Dunkirk areas. It doesn't say which parcels would hold the towers.

The Prairie Creek notices do name their parcels. That's where the question sits.

What MET towers do

A MET tower is a slim mast that carries wind-measuring instruments. Wind developers use them two ways.

The first is scouting. A tower collects wind data where a company is considering building turbines, usually for one to three years, before the company commits to a project.

The second is running a wind farm. A permanent tower feeds weather data to an operating plant's control system and helps test whether its turbines perform as promised.

The petitions filed with the county may say which use each tower serves. The hearings are where residents can ask.

Where these towers would stand

The northern parcel sits well inside the project area the county has approved, in the part of the county where Prairie Creek construction has begun. That position works for a tower serving the wind farm. The same parcel runs to the Grant County line, state parcel records show. A tower there would measure wind at the border of a county where RWE has no approved project.

The southern tower site raises the question more sharply. County property records place the parcel on the south side of County Road 200 S. On the project-area maps attached to the county's economic development agreements, that road is roughly the southern limit of the project's southwest lobe. The Ledger's reading of those maps places the parcel at the edge of the approved area.

The Paul J. Perry Living Trust owns the southern tower parcel, county assessor records show, and the county recorder's index lists wind-energy lease documents between the Perry family and RWE companies going back to November 2020. The recorder's index also shows RWE leases signed by other owners of farmland south of 200 S, outside the mapped project area, including A & S Land LLC and members of the Hile family.

Put together: a tower built to measure wind, at the edge of the approved project area, on leased land, next to more leased land outside the area. That is the pattern a developer produces when it's studying new ground.

Neither tower would sit in the middle of the project. Each would stand where the approved area ends. A MET tower measures the wind around it, and a tower placed at a boundary gathers data that describes the ground on both sides.

That matters because of what sits on the other side. Across the line is a county where RWE has no approved project. South of 200 S is farmland the company holds under lease, outside the area the county approved. If Prairie Creek were weighing more turbines to the west or south, towers in these two spots are where the measuring would start. The documents don't say that's the plan. They say these are the spots.

The Grant County line

Both sites hug the county's western edge. The northern parcel borders the Grant County line, and the southern parcel stands a few hundred feet east of it, state parcel records show.

Grant County commissioners signed off on a road use agreement with Prairie Creek Wind LLC in November 2024 covering County Road 1200 E, which runs along the county line, for project construction traffic. All Grant County documentation gathered by the Ledger to date shows no RWE application for turbines or weather towers in Grant County itself.

Grant County has its own wind history. Commissioners there passed a moratorium on new wind farm permits in unincorporated Grant County in January 2014 after residents fought a planned expansion of the Wildcat Wind Farm. The Ledger hasn't confirmed whether any moratorium remains in effect.

What's already approved

The BZA granted Prairie Creek Wind, LLC's special exception in August 2022 for a project of up to 202.5 megawatts. In September 2025, the board approved Prairie Creek Wind Farm II's special exception for 23 more turbines by a 3-0 vote. Both economic development agreements with the county list installing meteorological towers as pre-construction work.

The timing adds one more thing to watch. On Nov. 10, the Blackford County Area Plan Commission voted 7-0 to put public discussion of moratorium processes for data centers, wind and solar on its Dec. 1 agenda. All five MET tower requests come before the BZA ahead of that discussion.

How to weigh in

Written comments on either petition may be filed with the BZA secretary before the hearings. Anyone may also speak at the hearings. On Nov. 17, the board will also hear a petition for a private club at 221 N. Cherry St. in Hartford City and two sign requests.