For cash-strapped farmers with plenty of open land, wind-energy turbines offer a sorely needed windfall. But "not in my backyard" clashes are arising throughout the East and mid-Atlantic regions, pitting local farmers against "citiots"—people who "buy a second home and affect community decisions by being there two days a week," says Frank Masaino, spokesman for a mid-Atlantic coalition of wind developers.

Citiots say they're just protecting the unspoiled idyll that they paid for. Louis Freedman, a public-policy consultant in Washington, D.C., opposes a project near his second home in Virginia because the land is "sacred" and more valuable than the energy savings. To him, perhaps.

For farmers, one wind turbine can rake in about $5,000 a year in rent, compared with $300 for corn or soybean farming. "These people can't understand that they're living in the middle of my business," says Steven Schwoerer, a dairy farmer from Normal, Ill., whose effort to put a wind farm on his private land has been blocked by part-time neighbors. Such projects, he says, are "good for my community and for my grandchildren, and if you don't like it, go back to town."