ATC takes stance on Wind turbines: no stance

[SavageLlama]

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width=518 border=0><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top align=left>More hot air on the ATC and wind turbines from the RutVegas Herald..


ATC neutral on wind projects
By Susan Smallheer
Rutland Herald
April 14, 2005

</TD></TR><TR><TD class=articleText vAlign=top align=left><!-- PHOTOS AND EXTRAS --><!-- END EXTRAS -->NORWICH, VT — The Appalachian Trail Conference will evaluate proposed wind projects on New England's high ridgelines on a case-by-case basis, rather than taking a one-policy stand, a trail official said Wednesday.

J.T. Horn told a standing-room-only crowd at the Montshire Museum on Wednesday evening that the ATC opposes a major wind project in western Maine, but will remain neutral for two projects in Vermont.

Horn said the trail organization has decided not to get involved in other wind energy projects, such as the expansion of the Searsburg wind project in southern Vermont or the proposed wind project on Glebe Mountain, also in southern Vermont.

Much of the Appalachian Trail is in prime wind territory, Horn said, putting the trail at times directly in the line of controversy.

Horn was one of three panelists to discuss the pluses and minuses of wind energy development. The others, Dan Reicher, president of New Energy Capital and a former official in the Department of Energy during the Clinton administration, and Brad Kuster, an attorney with the Conservation Law Foundation, had a less-conflicted view of wind development. Both said the future of wind development was very strong, as individuals and political leaders ask for more and more renewable energy.

Horn, whose office is in Lyme, N.H., is in charge of all land stewardship, trail maintenance and land acquisition for the 730 miles of the trail between Connecticut and Maine, and wind projects are popping up near the trail.

And he said the ATC has had to search its scenic soul about what was acceptable to hikers and what was not. People don't hike in the dark, he said, they are interested in views.

"We've really wrestled with that and we've decided on a case-by-case approach," Horn said.

Horn said the project the ATC is fighting against would spoil the views on 33 miles of trail in the Mahoosuc Range in western Maine, near the New Hampshire border.

He said the Redington Range project was at one point 1.1 mile from the Appalachian Trail. Another factor that convinced the hiking organization to fight the project was that it was in a remote, undeveloped region of 4,000-foot peaks. And the project, 29 turbines with towers that would stretch 410 feet tall, would require building 10 miles of road and 10 miles of power line.

The Redington Range project is proposed by the company Endless Energy, which also has a proposal to develop wind on Equinox Mountain in Vermont.

But Horn said the ATC decided to remain neutral on the proposed expansion of the Searsburg wind project, even though the expansion in part would be into the Green Mountain National Forest and would likely set a national precedent on the use of federal lands for wind development.

Horn said the Searsburg project was 11 miles away from the trail, and the ATC had decided on a position of "nonopposition."

Glebe Moutain, which has drawn fierce local opposition to the wind project in the Londonderry-Weston area, is 10 miles from the trail, he said. Again, the ATC will take a position of "nonopposition," Horn said.

In Massachusetts, another wind project on the top of Brodie Mountain, which would have been visible for Mount Greylock, also didn't rise to the level of opposition, he said, because Mount Greylock itself already has mountaintop development.

One of the keys in selecting a site for wind development should be the general public's expectation of the site, he said. If people are expecting wild scenic views than wind energy should probably be captured elsewhere, Horn said.

"Camel's Hump is not a place that should have a wind farm," he said, referring to Vermont's most distinctive mountaintop.

Horn said the trail wasn't blind to the ramifications of air pollution from fossil fuels, and the pollution haze often obscured the scenic views sought by many hikers.

Keith Dewey of Weston, a wind energy supporter, asked Horn what his definition of ugly and pretty was. Horn said in response, the issue wasn't always about aesthetics, but about change.

Reicher, who is a former assistant secretary of energy efficiency and renewable energy at the U.S. Department of Energy and now teaches at Vermont Law School, said renewable energy portfolio standards in 18 states was fueling the wind energy development.

If Vermont set a goal of getting 20 percent of its electricity from wind, that would mean 200 megawatts of wind energy, Reicher said. And that would mean less than 200 turbines on a small number of Vermont ridgelines.

Reicher said environmental writer Bill McKibben, an advocate for increased wilderness in the Adirondack Mountains, supported wind energy development in that remote and wild section of New York.

"He says he looks forward to the day when he can look out and see wind turbines," Reicher said.
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[Pencil Pusher]

Without an accompanying link and taking this at face value, it sounds like a reasonable and well-thought-out 'stance' on wind turbine issues. What's the problem?

[Caleb]

This was well written (thanks Savage). The ATC might have searched its soul but it isn't willing to surrender much...and why should it? - no one else is.

Oh well, this is only 2005 and this was only round one ATC vs. Windpower. At some point all these folks will get around to reading Bill McKibbon and as time progresses the choices will only get easier.

[Rocks 'n Roots]

The headline isn't really accurate since ATC still opposes Trail-harming windmill projects like those in Maine.

When big powers decide windmills are what they want watch the headlines say what they want to hear...

[Daddy Longlegs]

I am for keeping the "views" clean but if a small wind farm works and keeps the region from making more dams ( a lot of damage to the streams and rivers) or coal plants (lungs can't work) then let a wind farm happen so that it will help the many and not the few.

[SGT Rock]

Looks like the ATC has stuck to deciding based on the impact on the trail, as it should, instead of cart blanch opposing any windmills. Seems like they made a logical and consistent decision.

[Rocks 'n Roots]

The windmills aren't for reducing coal pollution. They are for providing an energy source to allow the sprawl that will further encroach onto the AT to continue. They would have used coal to power this expected unchecked development, but they've gotten to the point where coal pollution is rotting the earth. They love it because it makes them look environmentally conscious. It's biggest value is false green points while the real agenda is sprawl.

When America's last remaining wild places (ridgelines) are covered in turning eyesore windmills the industrial monster's task of covering everything in development will have come true. It will be a nightmare for wild places. That's why the sprawl bastards are all for it.

Most Trail members who take the stance "well, they've made a rational and sound decision" are people who probably wouldn't notice the difference anyway (or care). They're coming for the ridges boys. Keep watchin...

[Nean]

I'm not sure if the ATC is the organization to fight the "sprawl bastards" 10 or 11 miles from the trail but it is good to hear that they do take a stance when they get a mile or two away. From what little I know, windmills seem reasonable, considering past and present alternatives. I know I sleep better knowing there are well infomed people out there, putting in their time and energy, fighting those "bastards" for every inch. TTTTH

[weary]

I'm not sure if the ATC is the organization to fight the "sprawl bastards" 10 or 11 miles from the trail but it is good to hear that they do take a stance when they get a mile or two away. From what little I know, windmills seem reasonable, considering past and present alternatives. I know I sleep better knowing there are well infomed people out there, putting in their time and energy, fighting those "bastards" for every inch. TTTTH

ATC has joined with the Maine Appalachian Trail Land Trust to oppose wind turbines on the Redington Mountain range and Black NUbble, located just west of the trail in Maine.

This nation needs a rational energy policy, but does not have one. Alternative energy is an essential part of that mix.

But it is not necessary to destroy the last wild places to achieve that mix. We should not damage the wild places along the trail in the mistaken belief that this is in anyway a wise policy.

We need to remember also that all energy has impacts -- especially including wind power. We need to recognize also that wind power exists primarily because of government subsidies. Wind is popular because an unwise law allows financial people to shelter profits from other investments.

The Maine wind developers in Maine essentially are lying to the public when it discusses the impact of the trail in Maine. It claims that its polls show that 80% of hikers approve towers in Redington. When pressed at the MATC annual meeting this month, the developer conceded that that approval rate was achieved by showing hikers "a better photo simulation" of what the towers will look like from the trail.

As anyone who has ever taken a photo of a mountain knows, photos, simulations or not, do not portray what the human eye sees. The eye and the brain concentrates the dominant bits of the land scape. To achieve a "realistic" photo of a mountain we use long focus lenses and frames of trees and other natural objects to approximate in the picture what the brain sees in the natural world.

I have an example of this phenomenon daily. By happenstance an 80-foot high church steeple exists across the bay, just a mile from my house -- the same distance as Redington wind towers from the Appalachian Trail. It's an incredibly beautiful scene. Almost everyone who sees it for the first time comments. The ancient church steeple dominates the landscape.

In 40 years of trying I have yet to produce a photograph that in anyway simulates what the eye sees because there is not natural frame I can include in the photo to give perspective to the view.

Yet the wind developers show simulations of towers four times higher and topped by 130 foot radius blades as being virtually invisible.

Weary

(No. The fact that I live on a pretty bay, does not mean I'm wealthy. It's just that 42 years a combination of luck and foresight prompted me to buy a dilapidated house on a grossly polluted bay for $2,900. It wasn't a bargain sale. The house had been on the market for six years. The bargain occurred as the house was rebuilt and Maine passed some of the first in the nation laws to force significant water cleanup.)

[Nean]

Thanks for the info Weary. Subsidies, that figures. I'm almost ashamed to admit that I've walked past windmills, roads, homes, towns, shelters and various other man made objects without a care in the world. OK I fibbed, some of those shelters are a bit much but I'd never go as far to say that they ruined my "wilderness" experience, unlike those goshdern "angels" and thier dadburn "magic".

[Tha Wookie]

Looks like the ATC has stuck to deciding based on the impact on the trail, as it should, instead of cart blanch opposing any windmills. Seems like they made a logical and consistent decision.

Sounds right to me. They have their place.

[Jaybird]

Savage Llama, thanks for the post.

I agree with above...the ATC needs only to put their proverbial "stamp-of-approval" on projects on a "case-by-case" basis....

As a hiker, a nature-lover that spends several weeks a year in the woods & wilderness areas....i'd much rather be walkin' by a wind turbine farm than a NUCLEAR POWER PLANT....think about it!

[Drum Stick]

I am on the fence regarding the windmills... Ideally we would not have to look at the windmills, I agree. But on the other hand I could look at them and say, well at least they serve a very good environmental purpose (reducing fossil fuel consumption / combustion / emmissions). Environmentalist types,including myself, say we need to employ alternative sources of energy. But then some go on to say so long as the alternative energy sources are not wind or hydro power... We might as well tie our hands behind our back then because there is not much else in many areas... Don't get me wrong, if there were other 'practical' energy solutions I would be all for them, but right now I do not feel we have the luxury of poo pooing wind or hydro power... Are dams still a big problem? Does anyone have insight on modern dams? Well if dams are a big problem then lets go nuclear... Nah I am not a big fan of nuclear either, especially because of terrorist threats... I would rather have wind and hydro thank you (for now)...

Sprawl is going to happen regardless of those windmills being erected. The days are long gone when a power company needs to string hundreds of miles of power line to get customers on the grid. So saying that the windmills will invite sprawl just does not compute with me because there are not many remote areas in Appalachia and plenty of power lines. Those windmills will simply put energy on the grid (existing power lines) to be consumed by whom ever is drawing power.

I agree, we do need a rational energy policy. But what we need to get a rational policy is cooperation and there is not much of that these days. So people like ourselves need to do what is right and stop waiting for guidance from our government.

What am I doing? I drive an economy 4-cylinder car (that is well tuned). I super insulated my home to reduce my energy consumption to the minimum, and no AC (just like much of Europe). Then I installed a state of the art biomass (wood pellet) stove. Each and everyone of us can drastically reduce the amount of fossil fuel we burn (right now) each year by heating our homes with biomass. Biomass is a 100% renewable energy source and very environmentally friendly. In fact a growing number of large power companies are burning biomass to reduce their emmissions. A great deal of research has gone into biomass fuels and the good news is that there is no shoratage of fuel in sight. I currently burn wood pellets but I can also burn corn, wheat and a few other biomass fuels. So what the heck is everyone waiting for??? I hope you are not waiting for big petroleum companies to turn you on to biomass fuel.

Folks, wood pellets can be purchased at The Home Depot for about $185 per ton (=50 40-pound bags).But I get my pellets from another place because the delivery man fork lifts the pallets right into my garage and this saves me some labor (Home Depot has curbside delivery). Next year I will order about five tons of pellets to heat my home because I am currently heating with 100% biomass. But my cousins each burn about 2-3 tons of pellets each year and their fossil fuel furnaces come on when the biomass fire goes out. My stove will burn 18+ hours on the highest setting, so I fill the stove with fuel basically once per day and empty the ash tray every 4-days.

Please see pelletstove.com for more info. There are a number of companies now producing pellet stoves around the world. IMHO Dell-Point is producing the best 'hot air' units, mighty clean combustion! Biomass Boilers are also available but they do get rather pricey.There are energy alternatives for the willing...

Few things make me laugh (and upset) more than people who talk / preach about the environment, bitch about corporate pollution and our goverment (as if they were the only violators), and then do nothing themselves to help. So what are each of us doing to solve our energy / pollution problems?

I wonder? Are the people who want to erect the windmills a power company seeking to reduce their emmissions? Or private land owners who simply see the potential profits in wind power? I can't see that we have the right to stop developers if they are playing by the law... But I would suggest that instead of the windmills we encourage power plants to raise their (or employ) biomass combustion instead and even provide incentives for doing so. I feel there should be a national effort to get everyone to burn more biomass fuel. Why isn't there?

Respectfully
Drum Stick

[Caleb]

Wind-gen has come a long way in 20 years. It's now at the point in many areas where costs per kw/hr are absolutely competitive witth new coal and oil installations. The PTC is still extant (1.5 cents/kw/hr), but if the true costs of coal/oil generation were internalized wind-gen is clearly cheaper. For instance, the federal government has paid out $35 billion over the past 30 years to cover the medical expenses of coal miners who suffer from black lung disease. Science magazine reported that coal-fired electricity would cost 50-100% more if these costs were taken into account. The hidden environmental and health costs of coal and other fossil fuels are also confirmed by a major 10-year study by the European Union. http://www.externe.info/externpr.pdf .



A better objection (as Rocks pointed out), is the question of the advantage of turbines in the mountains when the US is still hell-bent on fossil fuel consumption. This is a tougher-sell, and I understand why the ATC is treading slowly, but we're not giving the mountains away for nothing. Even if in the short term it might seem like wind-gen has the effect of perpetuating our carbon-gen culture and sprawl (as has been argued about recycling), just the opposite happens: wind-gen shifts the culture away from fossil fuels and every installation makes wind-gen more economically viable. Like I said, as time progresses the choices will only get easier - self-interest and common interest will no longer seem to be at odds.


For those of you who see wind turbines as just another form of pollution, I would point out that AS POLLUTION wind turbines have many advantages over the environmental accumulations of the heavy metals andlethal oxides of fossil fuel pollution. These advantages should be obvious. Bird-strikes and road building notwithstanding, if it's the biome of the actual trail we're worried about - the mountains, streams, trees and critters - wind power is a no-brainer. Whatever pollution is generated is mostly unobserved and doesn't effect the healthy functioning of th eco-sysyem. This is classic Leopold and Bill Mckibbon: from the point of view of the mountains, the mountains would rather have turbines.

[Caleb]

I feel there should be a national effort to get everyone to burn more biomass fuel. Why isn't there?

Respectfully
Drum Stick

nice ! I'm currently looking into buying a used diesel truck (I'm a carpenter) that I can retrofit to burn veg oil. It's a lot more complex an undertaking than I thought it would be - my creation might be more 'experimental' than I would like - but I'm going to do it.

[Drum Stick]

Excellent thought Caleb, converting your diesel to burn vegetable oil I mean.

I owned a VW Turbo Diesel and I wish I never sold it, I was regularly getting above 45MPG. I recently bought a VW Golf (gasoline) only because new diesel sales are currently outlawed in some states purely because of the lack of emmissions systems to test them. I understand that the diesel emission testing systems are in the works for many states so this situation will change. And VW is working hard to get their latest and greatest very clean diesels into the US. I actually looked into converting my old TDI to burn vegetable oil and the conversion kit was very cheap as I recall. I would imagine that conversion kits vary in price depending on the motor but I can't imagine that the price would be too high... How much do you figure the conversion will cost you for your truck? And how do you figure the emmissions test will be handled? I am not sure what the deal is in NH. I have been behind at least a few cars with a sign that says "this car runs on vegetable oil". Operators hook up with local restaurants like Mcdonalds etc. and use their old oil. McDiesels I have heard such vehicles called. Once the emmissions testing is all sorted out I just might get back into diesel etc.

Good luck with the conversion!
Drum Stick

[Tha Wookie]

I recently priced the conversion kit from deisel to cooking oil at $700. That included all the parts, but DIY labor. And you can also just burn biodeisel.

[MOWGLI]

Here's a little something that is slightly off topic. I received it today, and it relates to bird collisions with communications towers and power lines. I post it here, because bird collisions with wind turbines are a problem is some areas;

Two new fact sheets have been added to the IMBD website. Go to "Additional Resources" by visiting either homepage (www.birdday.org or at http://birds.fws.gov/IMBD).

2005 IMBD Fact Sheets

- Clear the Way for Birds!: IMBD Explores Bird Collisions

- The Danger of Plate Glass: Understanding and Avoiding That Painful Thud

- The Trouble with Towers: A Guide to Bird Collisions at Communication Towers (new)

- A Fine Line for Birds: A Guide to Bird Collisions at Power Lines (new)

- What Exactly Is International Migratory Bird Day?

- Celebrating International Migratory Bird Day

[weary]

Savage Llama, thanks for the post.

I agree with above...the ATC needs only to put their proverbial "stamp-of-approval" on projects on a "case-by-case" basis....

As a hiker, a nature-lover that spends several weeks a year in the woods & wilderness areas....i'd much rather be walkin' by a wind turbine farm than a NUCLEAR POWER PLANT....think about it! :

I have. And checked the facts also. I've discovered that you're thinking about an imagined choice. Damaging wild areas with industrial-sized wind complexes will make some people a lot of money, but will do nothing to stem the return of the nuclear industry.

It will diminish the opportunities to hike on trails that are as wild as the crowded east makes possible these days. If society is to make wise choices we need to try to rise above slogans and cliches and look at facts.

Weary

[Drum Stick]

I see nothing off topic MOWGLI16. Birds smacking into windmills has been a problem for a long time, and probably as long as windmills have been around. I actually wanted to put up a small windmill on the shore of a lake in Maine as a project for fun. But then I learned of the bird problem and scrapped the idea, especially because the location of our bird feeders and houses had already established a flight plan for the birds.

We people must just decide if the birds getting killed is acceptable.
Drum Stick