How much tax money a wind farm brings an Iowa county
How much tax money a wind farm brings an Iowa county comes down to Adair County, which hosts more wind turbines than any other county in the state, 506 of them, 8% of every turbine in Iowa. In fiscal year 2023 to 2024 those turbines generated 5,503,461 dollars in tax revenue for the county, a Center for Rural Affairs case study built on Iowa Department of Management filings shows. Wind turbines make up 25.7% of the total taxable property valuation of Adair County, the value assessors use to set property tax, not 25% of the total revenue of the county. Getting that distinction right took reading the case study directly, because valuation and revenue measure 2 different things and only one of them is money the county actually collects.
The mechanism, a tax break that grows for 7 years
Adair County Ordinance No. 31, adopted October 3, 2007 under Iowa Code Chapter 427B.26, sets a special valuation schedule for wind turbines in place of the normal property tax rules. A turbine is taxed on 0% of its value in its first year, then the taxed share climbs to 5%, 10%, 15%, 20% and 25% across years 2 through 6, before settling at 30% in year 7, where it stays for the rest of its 19 assessment years. The county folded every turbine into one urban renewal area, a zone that lets the county borrow against the future tax collections the valuation schedule generates, called tax increment financing, rather than waiting for the money year by year. The state own filing for the following fiscal year, read directly from the Iowa Legislative Services Agency reporting system, records 5,478,634 dollars in financing revenue for that renewal area, across 21 tax districts.
Adair County Ordinance No. 31 sets this schedule in place of the normal property tax valuation rules, and the 30% rate holds for the remaining assessment years, 19 in total, unless the county repeals the ordinance.
Show the numbers
| Year 1 | 0 |
| Year 2 | 5 |
| Year 4 | 15 |
| Year 6 | 25 |
| Year 7 and after | 30 |
What the wind tax money paid for
Between July 2015 and January 2025, tax increment financing paid for 20.7 million dollars of road paving and 6.1 million dollars of bridge and culvert work. In fiscal year 2023 to 2024 alone, 4,009,054 dollars of that financing revenue was added to the 6.5 million dollar roads budget of the county, pushing total transportation funding past 10 million dollars, a 61% increase.
I've never had a wind turbine call me and complain about a road or anything else.
John Twombly, Adair County supervisor from 2009 to 2025. Source 1.
Total financing granted county wide between 2011 and 2024 reached 34.6 million dollars.
The third row is the sum of the first 2, rounded to the nearest tenth of a million dollars.
Show the numbers
| Regular roads budget, fiscal year 2023 to 2024 | 6.5 |
| Wind tax money added that year | 4.0 |
| Total transportation funding after wind money | 10.5 |
Road paving and bridge and culvert totals cover July 2015 to January 2025. The 34.6 million dollar total covers a longer, overlapping span, 2011 to 2024, from the same source.
Show the numbers
| Road paving, July 2015 to January 2025 | 20.7 |
| Bridge and culvert work, July 2015 to January 2025 | 6.1 |
| Total financing granted, 2011 to 2024 | 34.6 |
Beyond the roads budget
The Nodaway Valley Community School District, 635 students and 53 teachers, has 80 Adair County turbines inside its boundaries, valued at 46,363,097 dollars, 16% of the total property value of the district, producing 253,081 dollars in extra district funding. The district put the money toward a school bus lease and a heating and cooling project.
It benefits many of our participating landowners and the entire community, both directly and indirectly, as something that brings their agricultural communities together.
Matt Ott, project developer at MidAmerican Energy. Source 5.
About 70% of the turbines in the county were built between 2018 and 2020, and a 7 year phase in required under Iowa law means another 150 million dollars will be added to the total wind valuation over the next 5 years, a 56% rise from the 2022 figure.