It seems few in this town of about 1,500 people can agree on UPC Wind Management’s newly completed $85 million project, which makes the unassuming potato-growing and truck-brokerage community home to New England’s largest wind farm. But there’s one thing everybody can agree on: The place sure looks different. Long before a visitor arrives at Mars Hill, the towers become visible along what used to be just another mountain. The total height from the ground to the tip of the blade is 389 feet. Each tower has three blades, which spin in winds whipping west to east toward Canada just a few miles away.

Plans for two separate wind farms visible from Exmoor have come up against another hurdle. Campaign group Open Spaces Society has launched objections to the projects, stating they would have a negative impact on the feel of the moor. The two projects are the Three Moors scheme at Knowstone, North Devon, where the company Airtricity Developments hopes to erect nine turbines, and Bickham Moor, near Oakford, Mid Devon, where Coronation Power want to erect four. Kate Ashbrook, Open Spaces Society's general secretary said: "We are dismayed that the wind-energy companies keep applying to erect turbines in this part of North Devon. There are already two outstanding applications nearby, at Batsworthy Cross and Cross Moor."

He told the Lynn News: "The intention is to protect the unusual and singular view of places like The Fens and also the lush and picturesque landscape of North West Norfolk. "The Fens is a place internationally recognised as an area of flat landscape where rainbows can be seen end to end and both sound and vision can be measured in miles rather than yards. "The rest of North West Norfolk is also a rare and beautiful place and I am attempting to protect it for future generations by limiting the height of any structure built in open countryside to a very generous 246 feet - which seems to be more than reasonable."

Plans for 276 large wind turbines in Central Otago would not "turbinise" the Lammermoor Range in Central Otago, a Meridian expert said. Landscape expert Peter Rough said while the landscape would be changed by wind turbines, its rural character would remain. "It's still fundamentally a rural landscape with an element of energy product," he said in the Environment Court in Queenstown yesterday.

In evidence to the Central Otago District Council last year Meridian acknowledged the turbines each of which will have a rotor roughly the size of a Boeing 747 would have an adverse visual impact on the nearby Paerau Valley. But it produced photographic mock-ups suggesting that from other vantage points the mountain block on which they would be arrayed would remain the dominant visual feature. However, Sydney says the windfarm will "industrialise" the landscape for vast distances. "What happens when you put that number of wind turbines of that size in the landscape is that they actually become the landscape. You don't see anything else really."

"Wyoming is not only a recipient for proposals for transmission, we're also (electricity) generators," Lahti said. And wind turbines, which can reach 400 feet, will dominate the views in parts of Wyoming unless state and federal governments, historical preservation organizations, tribes and industry avoid cluttering the landscape before they build, he said.

"We don't want to see them. Standing on the beach, we don't want to see them," he said during the council's work session Tuesday afternoon. Councilman Jim Hall echoed the mayor's sentiment, saying the project could prove far more popular if the turbines were invisible from land. "If you can't see it," Hall said, "then you can add acres and acres of wind farms. I think people are going to eat it up." For Bluewater, it's an expensive courtesy. Lanard said pushing the turbines farther out to sea makes it more expensive. It costs $1,000 for every foot of cable connecting the wind farm to the shore.

Residents are celebrating after plans for a wind farm near Beverley were thrown out. East Riding councillors unanimously rejected proposals to build a wind farm with 12 turbines up to 100 metres high at Routh, because of concerns they would spoil the views from Beverley Westwood. As reported on the Mail’s website yesterday, councillors voted against the scheme proposed by Ridgewind Limited amid fears views of Beverley Minster, in particular, would be ruined.

A NORTH Sutherland community stands to gain up to half a million pounds a year in community benefit from wind farms, it emerged this week. But the "pot of gold" has failed to impress some Strathy residents who this week angrily dismissed it as a sweetener, aimed at making them accept major changes to their local landscape. ...The power company wants to build a £90 million, 35-turbine development on the north side of Strathy and a follow-up 77-turbine development on the south side of the forest.

Villagers fighting plans for a wind farm on the outskirts of Teesside have called on the area's civil and military airports to back their campaign. They are urging Durham Tees Valley Airport and RAF Leeming to object to the proposed 11 turbines in Bishopton near Stockton and Darlington on the grounds of air traffic safety. "If the turbines mean there is radar or air traffic interference, then surely lives are being put at risk," said action group spokesman Peter Wood. ...An MoD spokesman said: "All applications are assessed on a site by site basis." Similar air traffic safety concerns have been raised regarding potential plans for a wind farm of five turbines between the villages of Hilton and Seamer.

The Quebec Environmental Public Hearing Board has rejected a $350-million wind power proposal from a Toronto company that wanted to build an expansive farm in the province’s northeastern region. The board, known by its French acronym, BAPE, gave the thumbs down to Skypower’s plans, which would include the construction of 114 windmills in four communities bordering the St Lawrence seaway, near Rivière-du-Loup. The board, which held several hearings on the project, concluded Thursday that the turbines would ruin a picturesque view, threaten the region’s natural and wildlife heritage and threaten the agricultural economy.

Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) like the Lake District national park could be the sites of new energy infrastructure including wind farms, Ed Miliband has suggested. Asked if wind farms could be considered in AONBs, Mr Miliband said: "In exceptional circumstances, it may be possible for some limited development to take place without unacceptable impacts on these important sites."

Big name backing has come forward in opposition to two proposed wind farms at Spaldington who claim the turbines would be "visually horrific, inappropriate and ineffective". Throwing their weight behind the STOP (Spaldington Turbines Opposition Project) group is not only Howden and Haltemprice MP David Davies but MEP Godfrey Bloom and international best-selling author Frederick Forsyth. ...David Davis told the Courier this week: "Both of these proposed wind farms would seriously blight the lives of people who live nearby.

Campaigners fighting plans for a wind farm near the Naseby battlefield site say new proposals to move the turbines further east will make no difference to their visual impact for villagers. ...the latest plans place the turbines on lower ground further east, still south of the A14 but closer to Kelmarsh Hall. Eon says this will create less visual impact on the villages of Naseby and Haselbech.

A COMMUNITY group of concerned citizens has formed in the wake of Snowy River Shire Council approving a development application for a 16-turbine wind farm at Snowy Plain.

Plans for a controversial wind farm near Pontefract have been slammed by a Wakefield Council consultant. The news has come as a massive boost to local pressure groups fighting a dogged campaign to see off the plans by developers Banks Developments. ...Campaigners in Pontefract claim the wind masts are too close to local homes, will ruin their peaceful community and drive down house prices. ...Since then the Landscape Architect working for Wakefield Council has drafted his own response to the plans. A summary released by PWAG reads: "The turbines are close to residential dwellings. Their height results in them being visible over a relatively large area and the impact on the landscape character of Went Edge will be severe.

Protesters campaigning against a wind farm in the countryside straddling Barnsley and Sheffield have been dealt a blow with a fresh council report which suggests the benefits of the scheme would outweigh the visual impact. The planning application for the five turbines, which would be 400ft tall, has gone to Barnsley Council because the land where they would be sited at Sheephouse Heights falls within the town's boundaries. But they would be so close to the border with Sheffield that the council there has been asked to comment before the application is considered.

West Virginia boundary commission members Charles Sypolt and Curt Keplinger visited Tamarack Ridge Saturday morning to inspect the site of a proposed industrial wind farm. ...Governor Manchin formed the boundary commission in September after the Pocahontas County Commission alerted him that the wind project might encroach into West Virginia territory. The county commission became concerned after the developer, Highland New Wind Development, LLC (HNWD), issued a site plan with the state line re-plotted on the base topographic map and two turbines very close to the re-plotted state line.

The three-blade turbine reaches roughly 155 feet. That includes a pole that is 120 feet high. The owners recently decided to move the project about 150 feet north toward the back of the property. That should reduce the "shadow flicker," a complaint of some neighbors, Kenney said. The rotating blades create shadows. Moving the turbine also will slightly reduce the sound ...

Campaigners are celebrating victory after plans to build three large wind turbines in the heart of the Hawker country were thrown out. North Cornwall councillors went against planning officers' recommendations and last week refused plans by West Coast Energy to build three 81-metre (260ft) turbines near Crimp, just outside Morwenstow. One of the main reasons for refusal was "unacceptable visual impact with an accumulative effect with Forest Moor in Bradworthy."