Who benefits from Renewable Electricity? The differential effect of wind power development on rural counties in the United States

Abstract

Wind power development has rapidly expanded in rural areas in the United States. It is widely accepted that there are positive economic impacts of wind power projects, but less clear is whether those benefits are the same in rural areas as compared to more metropolitan locations. This paper examines this question using two complimentary approaches. It first examines the impacts of increases in accumulated wind power capacity across all U.S. counties with wind power from 1990 to 2015 to establish a baseline for counties regardless of their urbanity. To measure the economic and demographic impacts of wind development in rural counties, we compare rural (nonmetropolitan and nonurban) counties with wind developments over 100 megawatts to a group of similar rural counties lacking wind developments. We find that wind power has significant positive effects on per capita income, farm income, employment, and reduced poverty rates when considering all counties. However, for rural counties, the only statistically significant effect is on farm income, which may well stem from land lease payments. We surmise that rural areas do not fully capitalize on the economic benefits of wind power development because of their small and often highly specialized economies.