NEW LONDON, IOWA -- With energy costs and the need for electricity on the rise, more and more communities are turning to alternate sources of energy to generate their electricity.
New London, Iowa is one of the most recent towns to welcome a wind turbine tower.
Construction of the tower began in October and took about a month to complete. The turbine is now fully fuctional and provides electricity to about 450 local homes when the winds reach seven miles per hour.
"Three years ago, we started looking at wind energy, and went through several companies before we found the one we wanted," Scott Housman of the New London Utility Board said. "We ended up with Shermco Industries out of Irvine, Texas, and they constructed the tower for us."
The 1.5 mega watt tower is 270 feet to the center of the hub and each blade is 140 feet long. It provides electricity to homes as far north as Yarmouth, and as south as New London.
Housman says the public has been mostly supportive of the project.
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