{"id":8547,"date":"2018-05-25T17:07:31","date_gmt":"2018-05-25T17:07:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=8547"},"modified":"2018-05-25T17:07:31","modified_gmt":"2018-05-25T17:07:31","slug":"wind-farms-propel-willacy-county-economy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=8547","title":{"rendered":"Wind Farms Propel Willacy County Economy"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Turbines<\/a>

Turbines from one of E-On wind farms near San Perlita west of Raymondville generating power for homes in Central Texas. Photo: Tony Vindell\/LFN<\/p><\/div>\n

by Tony Vindell\/LFN<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

About a half dozen wind farms are located in the Rio Grande Valley today with Willacy County having two of the largest ones.<\/p>\n

They are E-On Climates & Renewables and Duke Energy. A third one is in the early stages of being launched.<\/p>\n

E-On and Duke are helping propel the economy of Willacy County, a predominantly agricultural region.<\/p>\n

Just recently, E-On held a grand opening of its second wind farm north of Texas Highway 186 between Raymondville and San Perlita.<\/p>\n

And to mark the completion of the project, the company and the constructor in charge of building the windfarm gave a show of support to the community by donating $115,000 to the Willacy County Emergency Medical Services.<\/p>\n

County, business and company representatives met in the San Perlita Community Center to witness the two events which drew plenty of applause by those present.<\/p>\n

Rich Saunders, a spokesman with E-On, said a wind farm such as theirs contributes to a county like Willacy.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe estimate that $7.2 million was spent locally,\u201d he said. \u201cWe hired about 40 percent of the labor force from the Valley.\u201d<\/p>\n

Willacy County Judge Aurelio \u201cKeter\u201d Guerra said windfarms are tremendous projects.<\/p>\n

He thanked the landowners who allowed wind mills on their properties and the windfarm for helping the economy, particularly since the closing of Wal-Mart and of the biggest prison at the jail complex east of Raymondville.<\/p>\n

The $115,000 donation made to EMS will go toward the purchase of a new ambulance.<\/p>\n

Frank Torres, its director, said it costs about $400,000 to buy a new ambulance completely equipped and ready to go.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have six ambulances, but one is a reserve,\u201d he said. \u201cWe need a new one\u201d<\/p>\n

As to the donation, Torres said, \u201cIt\u2019s $115,000 we don\u2019t have to come up with.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Tony Vindell\/LFN About a half dozen wind farms are located in the Rio Grande Valley today with Willacy County having two of the largest ones. They are E-On Climates & Renewables and Duke Energy. A third one is in the early stages of being launched. E-On and Duke are helping propel the economy of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":8548,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-valley"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8547"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8547\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8549,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8547\/revisions\/8549"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}