Here’s yet another windmill picture. This one was taken about a mile north of Parish’s Grove. At this point in the day’s ride I was still a long way from being done with windmills.

This scene may look peaceful enough — all my hours riding along Benton County’s windmills were peaceful and quiet. But surely something like this couldn’t be built without angry conflict, could it?

I wondered just how economically sustainable these towers are. I like the idea of using them for a sustainable energy supply, but I’d like them to be economically sustainable, too. Would they exist if there weren’t subsidies — subsidies of the type that usually lead to corruption and market distortions that cause problems greater than the ones they were intended to solve?

I found a couple of anti-windmill web sites:

• A blog: Blowing Our Tax Dollars on Wind Farms
• National Wind Watch

These are not exactly what I was hoping to find, though. They seem to include just about every anti-windmill argument that can be made, including some that specific to windmills or relevant to economic sustainability. It makes me wonder if there is some NIMBY going on here.

What I’d like to know is whether at some feasible level of Pigovian carbon tax these windmills would become sustainable without subsidies and tax credits. If not, I fear that these windmills might eventually become to be seen as a boondoggle. But that’s not the kind of analysis I’ve been able to find yet. So for now I just enjoy the memory of my ride through windmill country, and I hope that the people of Benton County like them, too.

Eleven miles later I came to this bridge over Sugar Creek on Indiana state route 71. The windmills here were already in operation, spinning slowly in the gentle wind at my back, but I didn’t hear a thing from them. So I don’t know how close to them a person has to be and how fast they have to be spinning before one can hear a noise that might be bothersome.

The 1832 militia company that was later dismissed at Parish’s Grove was said to have gone to Iroquois (in the state of Illinois) and then to Sugar Creek. The more well known Sugar Creek runs through Turkey Run and Shades state parks further south. But it wouldn’t have been that one. This Sugar Creek eventually reaches Watseka, which would have been another 10-12 miles of riding beyond Iroquois. But without knowledge of the trails that were in use in 1832, I decided that I really had no idea of where to go to follow in the path of that militia company. They said Sugar Creek, and this was Sugar Creek, so I would call this crossing good enough. I did know that they went to Iroquois, so I would end my ride there. Even at that, I was still 16 miles short of my final destination for the day.