Wind and Solar Leasing in Cerro Gordo County, Iowa

How it started: a 3,628-acre solar lease and a moratorium

The chain of events that ended in a permanent ban began in early 2023, when Cerro Gordo County officials learned that Chicago-based developer Ranger Power had leased 3,628 acres of land in the city of Clear Lake for a proposed utility-scale solar project. In response, the Board of Supervisors enacted a 15-month temporary moratorium on any new utility-scale renewable-energy development across the county starting in May 2023 -- pausing new projects while the county worked out how, or whether, to regulate them going forward.

That pause turned into an extended public process. During early 2024, the county's Planning and Zoning Commission held five separate public input meetings on renewable-energy development, reportedly drawing more than 300 residents across the series combined -- a genuinely large public turnout for a rural Iowa county's zoning process. In May 2024, following the Commission's recommendation, the Board extended the moratorium another four months, through December 2024, and in June 2024 the Commission published a formal report titled 'Concerning Regulations for Industrial (Utility-scale) Wind and Solar and Battery Installations,' laying the groundwork for what came next.

The outcome: a unanimous, permanent ban on ag land

At a December 23, 2024 meeting -- after roughly two hours of public debate involving nearly 40 speakers -- the Cerro Gordo County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to adopt Ordinance 69, permanently prohibiting industrial- or utility-scale solar energy systems, wind energy conversion systems, and battery energy storage systems as uses on land zoned A-1 and A-2, the county's two agricultural districts. Rather than simply restricting these uses, the ordinance removes them entirely from the county's special-uses category on ag land, meaning there is no discretionary approval path left to pursue for a new utility-scale project there under current zoning. One supervisor, Chris Watts, punctuated the vote by publicly returning an uncashed $500 campaign-contribution check from Ranger Power at the meeting, calling it 'a bribe' -- illustrative of how contentious the underlying debate had become.

The ordinance does not reach personal or on-site renewable energy use -- rooftop or ground-mounted solar panels serving an individual home, for example, are not affected. What it does foreclose is the specific thing a land buyer evaluating "wind or solar lease income potential" on Cerro Gordo County farmland might be hoping for: as of this writing, there is no path under county zoning for a new utility-scale wind, solar, or battery-storage project to locate on A-1 or A-2 land.

What this means for land that's already inside an existing project

Cerro Gordo County was already home to an operating wind project before this ban -- the Cerro Gordo Wind Energy Center, a roughly 40 MW project (repowered from an earlier installation) developed by NextEra Energy Resources. Ordinance 69 addresses new development going forward; it does not appear, from the reporting available, to have been framed as retroactively terminating an existing, already-permitted project's operation. If you're evaluating a parcel that already sits inside or borders this existing wind project, the relevant questions are about the specific recorded lease and easement terms on that parcel -- payment structure, term length, and decommissioning obligations -- rather than about Ordinance 69's new-development ban, which is a forward-looking restriction. Confirm both the ordinance's current text and any specific parcel's existing-project status directly with Cerro Gordo County Planning and Zoning before relying on either assumption.

What to verify before assuming this settles the question for your parcel

This ordinance was adopted through the county's ordinary zoning process (following a locally-adopted 2024 Comprehensive Plan), which means it can, in principle, be amended again by a future Board of Supervisors -- an outcome no more certain than any other zoning change, but worth knowing isn't legally foreclosed. Cerro Gordo County is also in the middle of a broader comprehensive rewrite of its zoning ordinance, subdivision ordinance, and zoning map following that same 2024 plan (see our county hub), so confirm Ordinance 69's exact current text and scope directly with Planning and Zoning rather than relying on this page or a news summary as the final word, especially if you're evaluating a lease offer or considering a land purchase specifically for its renewable-energy potential.