More than 60 people in northeast Indiana on Tuesday night weighed their interest in wind power against the power of wind, snow and sleet, and their curiosity won.

What drew them from Allen and surrounding counties on an icy evening was a presentation by Jimmy Bricker, extension educator and director from Benton County, and Justin Schneider, staff attorney with Indiana Farm Bureau.

Their message: Wind power can provide a windfall, both for the landowners who allow wind turbines to be erected on their land and for the local governments that host wind farms. However, the potential of wind power brings the risk of pitfalls that landowners should take care to avoid.

First things first: Yes, a wind turbine on your land can provide a significant yearly lease payment. Although those who sign wind-farm leases are notoriously tight-lipped about terms, Bricker said the 370 Benton County property owners who've agreed to allow turbines on their land are getting about $2 million total in lease payments yearly. That's more than $5,000 each.

Benton County, a mostly rural area in northwestern Indiana with a population of 9,000, is better suited to wind development than perhaps any other location in the state.

Investment of $1 billion is under way there. It isn't a boom for local employment; Bricker said the construction and mechanical skills needed to build wind farms is so specialized that nearly all 600 workers come from other places.

“There are no vacant houses, and there's no place to park,” he said.

“County government hasn't spent one cent on any of this,” he said. Instead of vying with other communities to heap money on industry, wind power came to Benton County paying its own way.

Schneider said that in the leases he's seen for wind power in Indiana, most call for options to operate turbines for 75-125 years; 99 years is a common lease term.

The point he emphasized above all others is simple: Don't go it alone when you negotiate a lease for wind power. Join with neighbors - as many as 100 or 200 - to reduce each landowner's share of costs and to bring the most expertise to negotiations. Presenting a block of thousands of acres a developer can negotiate for at once makes the deal more attractive and affordable to the developer, he pointed out.

That much land is necessary, at least given the current economics of wind-generated electricity.

Bricker said the footprint of each turbine tower is less than an acre; however, the developers will not place one on less than 70 or 80 acres of land. Farmers can continue planting in most of the land surrounding each turbine. What that means: Wind farms are spread across 7,000-10,000 acres, or more.