Wheatland resident tells Kenosha County board he was not notified of nearby battery‑storage plan, raises safety and transparency concerns

Chet Tater, a resident of the town of Wheatland, told the Kenosha County Board during public comment that he learned late about a proposed battery‑storage facility planned less than a mile from his home and raised multiple safety and transparency concerns.

"We were never told about this," Tater said, describing meetings he said were held between the town and the developer (named in the transcript as Robron Energy and elsewhere as Robin Energy) that residents first heard about in a September 2025 open house. He said the project proposal included a first‑year payment of $1,000,000 and $400,000 annually for the next 19 years and alleged the developer's contract contained multiple contingency clauses that would allow it to exit if production was unsatisfactory.

Tater also told the board the developer's filing initially described 61 battery units but that, at a community meeting on January 13, a project representative showed a paper indicating 197 units. "Almost 3 times what they published," he said, adding, "So how many more lies are they telling us?"

He raised safety claims about emergency planning, saying the facilities come with a "3 mile mandatory evacuation" and arguing that local residents have no analogous protections if an incident occurs. He urged the board to pursue legislation to protect rural farmland and to require greater transparency from towns and developers.

The county board did not debate the claims at the meeting; the comments were offered during the public‑comment period and no board action on the project was recorded. The transcript includes varying spellings and names for the company cited by Tater (Robron/Robin Energy) and refers to Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners as an investor; those company names and the payment and evacuation figures were presented by the speaker and were not confirmed during the meeting.

The chair closed citizens' comments and the meeting proceeded to supervisor reports and committee business.