Wind and Solar Leasing on Land in Grant County, West Virginia

Mount Storm: nearly two decades of utility-scale wind on the Allegheny Front

The Mount Storm Wind Farm, developed as NedPower Mount Storm (a joint venture between Shell and Dominion Resources founded in 2007), runs along roughly 12 miles of the Allegheny Front ridgeline in eastern Grant County, just east of Mount Storm Lake. It began commercial operation with 132 Gamesa G80 turbines rated at 2 MW apiece -- a combined 264 MW of capacity feeding the mid-Atlantic grid. The site is now operated by Clearway Energy Group, one of the largest renewable-energy owner-operators in the country, which acquired the project as part of a larger portfolio. For a Grant County landowner, that history matters as evidence, not trivia: the Allegheny Front's ridge-top wind resource here has been commercially proven at utility scale for close to two decades, through at least one change in ownership, which is a materially stronger signal than a developer's projection for an untested site.

A live repowering, not settled history: 132 turbines becoming 78 larger ones

Mount Storm is currently in the middle of a full "repower" -- and this is genuinely ongoing, current activity, not a historical footnote. In October 2024, the West Virginia Public Service Commission approved NedPower's proposal to remove all 132 existing turbines and replace them with 78 larger, more efficient turbines (reported as Vestas V117 models), increasing individual turbine height by more than 100 feet while nearly cutting the total turbine count in half. The stated benefits driving the approval included higher output per turbine, reduced visual and shadow-flicker impact from fewer, more efficient machines, and lower noise -- and company officials said the new equipment is expected to extend the project's operating life by roughly 35 years. Mechanical completion of the first phase of the repowering is targeted for the second half of 2026, with a second phase expected in the second half of 2027.

The commercial backing behind this repowering is itself a notable, concrete fact: in April 2025, Clearway Energy Group signed a 20-year power purchase agreement with Microsoft for 335 MW of the repowered facility's output, part of a roughly $735 million investment in the project -- one of the more prominent recent examples nationally of a technology company directly contracting for repowered wind capacity to serve its own long-term power needs. For a Grant County land buyer, this tells you the Allegheny Front's wind resource here isn't just historically viable, it's viable enough today to attract a fresh, multi-decade corporate power commitment and a nine-figure reinvestment -- a genuinely different, and stronger, signal than an aging wind farm running out its original equipment with no reinvestment plan.

What a wind lease on your own Grant County land would actually involve

Wind development follows a broadly standard sequence nationally, and Grant County is no exception: a developer typically begins with a wind-resource assessment (a met tower or remote sensing on the specific ridge), then offers an option/lease agreement paying a smaller fee during evaluation and permitting, followed by per-turbine royalties or a percentage of revenue once turbines are operating. Ridge-top and mountain-crest land along or near the Allegheny Front -- the same terrain that made the original Mount Storm site attractive -- is what a developer is realistically looking for; flatter valley or South Branch bottomland is far less likely to draw a wind-lease offer regardless of overall county-level wind activity.

Before signing anything, get clarity on points that matter more in practice than the headline royalty figure: the lease term and any automatic-renewal language; decommissioning obligations and whether the developer posts a bond or other financial assurance to actually remove turbines and restore the land; the scope of access-road and transmission easements, which often extend well beyond the immediate turbine pad footprint and can affect parts of a property far from any turbine; and how the agreement treats future repowering, since Mount Storm's own 2024-2027 experience shows that even an existing wind lease's terms can be revisited when a developer wants to swap in newer, larger equipment decades into a project's life. A renewable-energy-specific attorney, not just a general real estate attorney, is worth the cost given how long these agreements run and how much a repowering clause can matter down the line.

What to check before assuming your parcel has leasing potential

• Elevation and ridge exposure relative to the Allegheny Front and the existing Mount Storm site -- a parcel's wind resource is a function of its specific terrain and exposure, not just its county.
• Whether the Grant County Clerk's records already show a recorded wind lease, easement, or interconnection agreement crossing or bordering the parcel -- pull the actual chain of title yourself rather than taking a seller's word that a tract is unencumbered.
• Interconnection queue status and available capacity at the nearest substation or transmission line feeding the existing Mount Storm interconnection -- ask the transmission operator directly, since a parcel's proximity to an operating wind farm doesn't guarantee the grid has room for another one.
• Whether the repowering's construction activity (turbine removal, new foundation work, and any road/transmission upgrades through 2026-2027) affects access, traffic, or noise on or near a specific nearby parcel -- ask Clearway or the Grant County Commission for a current construction timeline if your land is near the existing site.
• Any applicable zoning, height, or setback rules, particularly given this project's history of local approval processes -- confirm current status directly with the Grant County Commission rather than assuming the county's general framework automatically covers turbine-specific siting the way it covers ordinary construction.