The Windy City ...

.... is Van Wert, Ohio, it turns out. On our way to visit Dad in Ohio, we followed a couple of trucks that looked like this:     

They were huge and we didn't realize what they were hauling until we crossed the Indiana - Ohio border and started to see these:    

These look like toys from a distance like this, but when you pass the propeller on a truck on the highway, you realize how big these wind turbines are.  They stand 350 feet tall, and the propellers are 160 feet long. There are two wind farms just outside Van Wert, Ohio, which is about halfway down the state of Ohio near the Indiana border. It is about 30 miles from St. Marys, where I grew up. One of the windfarms is in operation. I found this article describing the windfarms. When finished, a total of 152 wind turbines will be running, which will provide electricity for about 75,000 homes. Another wind farm closer to Lima, Ohio is due to be built in the next two years. That one should have around 200 turbines. According to the company's fact sheet:    

Offsets carbon dioxide emissions by approximately 1.3 billion pounds per year. That is the equivalent of planting an estimated 525,000 acres of trees – (Van Wert County and Paulding County combined are 530,000 acres), taking 114,000 cars off the road, or reducing the consumption of over 2.1 million barrels of oil. If electric cars were widely available, this project will produce enough electricity to power 479,000 electric cars for a year.    

The project is generating 300 construction jobs now and will mean 15 to 20 permanent maintenance jobs. It also generates 1.1 million dollars in lease payments to the farm owners who house the turbines. Sounds like a win-win situation for everybody. Besides, the windmills look really nice spinning lazily in the wind.