If there were a list of counties in Oregon that could use even the relatively few permanent jobs a wind farm would bring, Harney would be high on the list. Its unemployment rate is, at 14.4 percent, second only to Crook County’s 15.8 percent. Moreover, its high, wide-open spaces are well suited to the turbines.

Yet a proposal for Harney County’s first wind farm — the Echanis Project — may be challenged by the Oregon Natural Desert Association or others opposed to the project. ONDA is bothered by a couple of aspects of the project, one being the transmission line that would move electricity away from the project for use elsewhere. That line would cross publicly and privately owned land, including 1.32 miles of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.

Apparently more worrisome to ONDA is the appearance of the wind turbines themselves. Though they would be located on private land, they would be visible from a tiny portion of the nearby Steens Mountain Wilderness. In ONDA’s world, even the sight of a wind turbine is enough to ruin the wilderness experience.

We can agree that too much civilization by a wilderness area is likely to be a bad thing, but what’s being proposed hardly seems to be too much. Even if all three proposed wind projects were to be completed — and so far, plans have been submitted for only one — they would be visible from less than 5 percent of the Steens Mountain Wilderness lands. The Echanis project, meanwhile, which is the one for which the transmission line is needed, would be visible from less than half of 1 percent of wilderness lands.

Nor is the transmission line project — which must be approved by BLM and is what ONDA and others likely would challenge — likely to have a huge impact on nearby views, and BLM believes what impact it would have is acceptable.

ONDA officials say they’re not opposed to green energy, just opposed to this green energy. Wind farms are fine, in other words, just not this wind farm and not in this backyard.