Spatial and economic impacts of wind turbines on the economy of Oklahoma

Abstract

The purpose behind this research is to provide Oklahoman agriculturalists an opportunity to compare the economic benefits of their current agricultural enterprise to a wind energy enterprise. An enterprise in this sense is a possible business venture. A farmer may have a wheat enterprise, a corn enterprise, a cow-calf or stalker enterprise, etc. They can also have an energy enterprise with wind, oil or natural gas. To analyze the different enterprises available to an Oklahoman producer, I have obtained enterprise budgets from Oklahoma State University's Agricultural Economics Department so that I can list exactly what the costs and benefits are for each enterprise as well as give an average value to each expense and revenue. The enterprises I chose to look at are dryland wheat production in Garfield County, dryland corn production and dryland soybean production in Kay County, irrigated corn production in Texas County, dryland wheat with stocker cattle in Garfield County, and native pasture with a cow-calf operation in Woodward County.