About 75 people crowded into the Municipal District of Pincher Creek building's basement, some spilling into the hallway, on Jan. 20 to take part in a public hearing about proposed changes to bylaws 1062-02 and 1140-08. The former, the Municipal Development Plan bylaw is being looked at by MD Council to change to 1153-08, and the latter, the Land Use bylaw, to become 1154-08.

Five speakers let council know in advance that they would be making presentations and a few others added their opinions during the hearing.

Kevin Van Koughnett, who works in the wind energy industry, said that many questions remain.

"In regards to cumulative effects, it doesn't describe what effects the MDP will review," said Van Koughnett adding that people are not mind readers. He asked how Council would delineate a viewscape and said the bylaw has to be more definitive.

"Why here and why not there. It's not obvious to a lot of people why it is what it is," he said.

Stewart McRae said that the term viewscape is subjective and expressed concern that no designated size of a viewscape was given in the proposed bylaw.

"No one can tell another person what he or she likes to look at or what he or she doesn't like to look at," said McRae. He said it is essential to develop technologies like wind turbines for our planet.

McRae brought a signed petition with him opposing the bylaw changes and made it available for others to sign.

Bill Thorpe said the topic is one that has people polarized and said he sees himself somewhere in the middle. "I'm going to err on the side of conservative of where we put windmills until we get some more information," said Thorpe.

"There's a saying, ‘You can't eat scenery,' but there is value in these views."

Thorpe said he had done a bit of internet research on the decommissioning of wind turbines around the world and came up with almost 1500 hits on the subject.

He said the MD of Pincher Creek seems to be permitting windmill development, but are not really sure where it will take us.

"In 20 years a lot of these systems will be scrap metal," said Thorpe. He said he and his children do not want to be responsible to come up with the millions of dollars to clean them up.

Thorpe also expressed concern that the bylaw says that a review can be done after 500 WECS have been built, but 250 more can be approved at the same time the review is happening. He asked council to appoint someone to investigate costs related to turbines down the road and to have businesses put money upfront before constructing wind farms.

Curtis Sinnott of Sinnott Farm Services echoed the view that the terms viewscape and cumulative effects are subjective. He said if Council keeps trying to change bylaws the province might take their current authority away from them. His concern was that height restrictions on small WECS are not compatible with current machines available to power a farm.

"We sell a lot of products to people in the MD. We don't need more restrictions. We need a stronger economy," said Sinnott.

Allan Kettles said it is discriminatory to tell the wind industry where they can and cannot build turbines. He said ridges are not used for farming and cows know better than to climb up there to eat grass when it's better down in the valley. He encouraged councillors to give "serious, sober, second thought to not even consider moving to second reading."

Kettles said it is like the MD is telling the wind industry to get lost by placing so many restrictions on where they can build. He ended by saying that the only reasonable option in this matter is to go to a plebiscite.

Dennis Olson said that lawyers must be licking their chops anticipating all the lawsuits that will come against the MD if terms like non-preferred and viewscapes remain. However, Olson said it will be the taxpayers who end up footing the bill.

"I'm getting damn tired of all the bureaucratic BS that is going on," he said.

Olson said the proposed bylaws need to be rescinded and each wind farm looked at on a case-by-case basis.

Dean Kennedy said there are no facts supporting the case that tourists will stay away if turbines are built on ridges.

"I'm trying to make a living on a ranch. I'd like to have the same opportunity as someone east of the highway," said Kennedy who said it would be unfair for him not to be allowed to have a turbine because someone said the view was pretty.