This week, Concerned Citizens to Save Roxbury appealed the Maine Department of Environmental Protection's approval of the Record Hill Wind Project. The group wants the DEP's board to hold a public hearing to explore conflicting medical and technical information regarding the licensing of large wind turbine projects. The appeal comes while Gov. John Baldacci is on a trade mission in Europe to promote Maine as an attractive place to develop wind power.

At the Maine Medical Association's annual meeting, the group took up the issue of wind energy and public health. The MMA approved a resolution, submitted by Dr. Albert Aniel and Dr. Michael Nissenbaum, to encourage studies of the health effects of wind turbines.

Peter Kelley, the attorney for the group, said Tuesday that his clients have seen the quality of life they experienced before the windmills were constructed slip from their grasp. He said his clients are alleging that they were not properly notified about all that the construction process entailed. Noise, which Wendy Todd said Tuesday was not supposed to be an issue, continues to reverberate from the wind farm. Headaches and frayed nerves are now a problem, according to Todd, and property values among the homes allegedly affected by the project have diminished.

A group of Mars Hill residents who live near the second largest wind power project in the state have filed a lawsuit against the developer, First Wind, citing noise and health concerns and seeking compensation for a loss of property value. ...Wendy Todd says she and her husband were supportive of the project. ...Soon Todd says the intermittent sounds and shadow flicker from the turbines began to wear on her nerves.

Families who live on a portion of East Ridge Road and Mountain Road on the backside of Mars Hill say, at times over the past two and a half years, they've lived with unbearable noise. They feel their complaints have been ignored. Read and watch their story as reported by WLBZ Channel 2 in Maine.

Weighing in were Dr. Albert Aniel, an internist at Rumford Community Hospital, Dr. Michael Nissenbaum, a radiologist at Northern Maine Medical Center, former Gov. Angus King, a partner in Independence Wind and Dr. Dora Ann Mills, director of the Maine Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the state's chief medical officer. Aniel and Nissenbaum would like the state to place a moratorium on future wind projects until more research on the effects of turbines on people can be gathered and analyzed.

Dr. Albert Aniel will share his concerns about health risks associated with wind turbines with selectmen when they meet at 7 p.m. Thursday in the municipal building auditorium. Interim Town Manager Len Greaney said Wednesday that Aniel asked to be placed on the agenda to share issues he broached at a Feb. 18 Maine Department of Environmental Protection hearing on a proposed Roxbury wind power project.

As Maine preps for wind power, medical staff at Rumford Hospital say turbines may make people sick. Others beg to differ. The phrase "vibroacoustic syndrome" started him Googling. The worrisome set of symptoms - allegedly caused by exposure to low-frequency noise and linked by some to wind farms - sent him on a mission he didn't anticipate. This week Dr. Albert Aniel, an internist at Rumford Community Hospital, mailed a letter to Gov. John Baldacci. He visited the Mexico Board of Selectmen. He's contacting every town manager in the River Valley.

[T]here are some negatives associated with the increasingly popular form of alternative energy, according to a University of New Hampshire expert. But the cons - mainly noise and vibrations from the rotating turbines - are generally things people can live with, UNH assistant professor of geography Mary Lemcke said. In South Berwick, a 300-foot-high ridge across from Marshwood High School is being eyed as a possible location for a wind farm. A Cape Neddick-based alternative energy company is conducting a yearlong wind study there with the hopes a wind farm would be viable. For Wisconsin resident Gerry Meyer, however, the sound of five 400-foot-tall wind turbines located within three quarters of a mile of his home is simply unbearable.

State officials touted Maine's capacity to become a major producer of pollution-free wind power on Tuesday during a ceremony marking the first anniversary of electricity production at the Mars Hill wind farm. ...Several speakers at Tuesday's event did acknowledge that the Mars Hill facility has had challenges, however. Foremost among those is the ongoing noise concerns raised by some neighbors of the wind farm. Neighbors have claimed that UPC Wind is violating its permit conditions because of excessive noise from the turbines. Company representatives say all of the tests have come back showing that the facility is in compliance. But earlier this winter, an organization called Industrial Wind Action Group filed a complaint with the Maine Department of Environmental Protection claiming that UPC Wind used flawed methodology when calculating noise levels.

Neighbors have claimed that UPC Wind is violating its permit conditions because of excessive noise from the turbines. ...earlier this winter, an organization called Industrial Wind Action Group filed a complaint with the Maine Department of Environmental Protection claiming that UPC Wind used flawed methodology when calculating noise levels. UPC Wind's president and CEO, Paul Gaynor, said in an interview that the company has committed to doing a better job in the future ensuring that local residents know what to expect when a large wind farm is built nearby. "I know there was an expectation [in Mars Hill] about what these were going to sound like," Gaynor said. "These are big structures and they do make sound."

Controversy over a proposed wind power project in Byron and Roxbury continues to grow the closer Byron gets to its town meeting at 6:30 p.m. Monday. An article in the warrant seeks to amend Byron's building ordinance to allow 450-foot-tall wind towers and turbines to be placed along a ridge between Old Turk Mountain and Record Hill. ...Some information regarding noise levels in those letters and on Record Hill's Web site is being questioned publicly by coalition members Linda Kuras and Sarah Nedeau and others.

Environmental leaders and state energy officials are excited about all the interest in wind power, and all are learning more about it, thanks to Mars Hill. But the project has critics in its hometown. A group of about 18 homeowners in Mars Hill is angry about loud noise that is produced by the wind turbines. The neighbors say the noise is not consistent, that it can vary with weather and wind conditions. At times, it's almost inaudible. But at other thimes, they say, the noise can reach over 50 decibels in their homes, disturbing sleep and making life uncomfortable. ...the Town Manager of Mars Hill says he believes future wind projects should have guidelines for how close wind turbines are placed to homes. He says a turbine within 2,500 feet should have to get a noise easement from the homeowner, to avoid problems with complaints later on.

LEE, Maine - The developer of a wind farm proposed for northern Washington County told state regulators Wednesday that noise levels from the massive turbines are expected to be well within legal limits. Representatives of UPC Wind Management described Stetson Mountain - located between the communities of Danforth and Springfield - as an excellent location for a wind energy facility because of the remote location, existing road network and steady winds. "No site is ideal in every respect, but from our perspective, Stetson comes as close to ideal as you can get for wind energy," Dave Cowan, vice president for environmental affairs with UPC, told members of the Land Use Regulation Commission.

PUGWASH - Opponents of a proposed wind farm on the Gulf Shore got more fuel for the fire Friday night. Mark Harris, a pastor from Bridgewater, Maine, spoke Friday night at the Ground Search and Rescue in Pugwash about how a wind farm in Mars Hill, Maine has terrorized locals. He bought property in Mars Hill roughly 1200 feet away from the turbines, but hasn't done anything with it because of how unbearable the sound and strobing from them is. "Many of the mills we have, on certain days when the wind comes from a certain direction and the humidity is such and such, it will be all but silent at 1200 feet away where my home site would be. But come back the next day and it'll pound until you can't tolerate being there and there's no predicting when that will happen," he said. He said the wind farm has wreaked havoc on the town, with many people now dealing with health complications allegedly caused by the turbines' sounds and shadows.

The town of Mars Hill...is the test bed for all that is good and not so good about wind power in Maine. ... With the failure of two other wind power proposals - a thirty-turbine project in Redington Township outside Rangeley and a three-unit installation in the town of Freedom in central Maine - the Mars Hill experience raises the question of wind power's future in the state. An energy technology praised as the green alternative to fossil fuels and one of the solutions to global climate change has produced controversies that have split the environmental community in Maine and made enemies of natural allies.

Wendy Todd, a resident of Mars Hill, Maine, and her husband, Perrin, live about 2,600 feet away from one of the 28 turbines that compose the Mars Hill Wind Farm, Wendy Todd said. Todd's story is one opponents to the Ellis County wind project have referenced. When her family first heard about plans for construction of the project in 2006, they were not led to anticipate problems, she said. "We thought we had asked all the right questions. We thought ‘if we can deal with the visual aspect and get through the construction phase, we'll be all set,' " Todd said. "There was never any mention of strobing, shadow flicker was never even mentioned. The noise issues were put on the back burner almost immediately." However, she and her husband have been battling these issues, particularly the noise, which Todd said varies with the wind speed.

State regulators indicated Wednesday that they plan to pay closer attention to potential noise levels generated by wind farms proposed within the Unorganized Territory. Members of the Land Use Regulation Commission said the state should learn from the noise concerns that have arisen since a wind farm in the Aroostook County town of Mars Hill became operational earlier this year.

FREEDOM - The town's Board of Appeals has rejected plans to erect three electricity generating wind turbines on Beaver Ridge. After four weeks of hearings, the board late Thursday found Portland-based Competitive Energy Service's turbines would not meet town standards for noise, said Addison Chase, chairman of the appeals board. The board also ruled that CES must post bonding for future demolition of the turbines. The planning Board approved CES's application in December. Planning board members agreed with a study that determined the turbines would not exceed the 45 decibel limit set in the ordinance. The vote was 3 to 0. Francis Walker abstained from the vote. Appeals board members determined that the study had been based on faulty ambient, or background, noise levels, Chase said. The planning board had required CES to post a bond for the construction phase, but Chase said the ordinance clearly requires the company to bond for future demolition as well. CES can appeal Thursday's decision to Waldo County Superior Court or start the process over again with the Planning Board.

MARS HILL, Maine — Something has turned terribly sour for about 18 homeowners who live along the mountain roads where the state’s first and only wind farm has recently gone on line. To a man and to a woman, they feel betrayed, cheated, used, ignored, and dismissed. Put them in a room and they are spitting mad. Collectively, as they gather on a Saturday morning inside a home that sits in the shadow of the turbines, their anger is barely palatable. Since the turbines started up, they say, silence has become a luxury.