FREEDOM — The Planning Board on Thursday cleared the way for a plan to erect three electricity-generating windmills on Beaver Ridge. After deliberating more than six hours, the board, by a 5-1 margin, approved Competitive Energy Solutions’ application to build the turbines, each of which will reach nearly 400 feet into the air.

The proposed wind power project on Beaver Ridge received final approval Thursday from the Planning Board. The 5-1 vote set the stage for an expected appeal by neighbors who are opposed to the development. Although the vote was not unanimous, none of the Planning Board members were actually opposed to the project. While he believes the wind turbines are a good idea, Prentice Grassi said developer Competitive Energy Services of Portland failed to adequately address whether the project would comply with Freedom’s noise standards. “I’m not opposed to the project, but I’m unsure about some of the assumptions made in the noise study,” said Grassi.

The proposed wind power project on Beaver Ridge received final approval Thursday from the Planning Board. The 5-1 vote set the stage for an expected appeal by neighbors who are opposed to the development.

FREEDOM -- A proposal to erect three electricity generating wind turbines on Beaver Ridge came as close to being scrapped last night as it had during several hours of planning board deliberation. The board, which deliberated for about three hours last week and resumed its review Thursday night, talked seriously about limiting the company that hopes to install the turbines, Portland-based Competitive Energy Solutions, to a specific model. Such a limitation would have sent the company packing. "If that's where you are going, we might as well call it quits," said Richard Silkman, a partner at competitive energy.

A Canadian company hopes to build a wind power project in Franklin County that would be the biggest of its kind in the state. TransCanada, a large Canadian energy company that owns or controls roughly 7,700 megawatts of generating capacity in the United States and Canada, will file an application with the Land Use Regulation Commission within 30 days to build a $250 million to $300 million wind farm, according to a spokesman. If the application is approved, 44 turbines — each roughly 41 stories high — will be constructed on Kibby Mountain and the Kibby Range near the Somerset County line beginning as soon as next fall.

Now that the major potential stumbling block of just how much noise would be produced by three giant wind turbine installations topping out at nearly 400 feet over Beaver Ridge in Freedom lies behind them, members of the town planning board return to their deliberations this Thursday on the application by Competitive Energy Services (CES) to build the $12 million wind power project. That session, which could conclude the board’s role in the project, is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. at the town offices.

TransCanada Corp. is set to take another step on a path that will make it one of Canada’s largest windpower operators, with plans to build an up-to-$300 million US wind farm in the mountains of Maine. The company said Wednesday it is about to seek formal approval to build a 44-turbine windfarm in the Kibby Mountain Range, just south of the Quebec-Maine Border. The $250 million US to $300 million US project will see the 124-metre-high turbines built along 22 kilometres of ridge line in the Kibby Mountain Range just south of the Quebec border.

A Canadian energy company plans to apply for a permit to construct a $250 million to $300 million wind farm on two mountains in northern Franklin County, a company official said Tuesday. TransCanada will file an application with Maine’s Land Use Regulation Commission within the next 30 days, the company’s project manager, Nick Di Domenico said.

The planning board is scheduled to resume this week its review of an application for a wind turbine farm on Beaver Ridge. The board is to meet at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday at the town office. “We still have a lot more to do,” said Nancy Bailey-Farrar, the board’s chairwoman, following last week’s marathon session. Portland-based Competitive Energy Services, LLC hopes to construct three electricity generating wind turbines on Beaver Ridge. The estimated $10 million project includes three 260 foot towers, each of which would hold a 12-by-12-foot nacelle, which contains the turbine generator, and three 130 foot blades

With a single dissenting vote cast in a series of motions over three hours, the wind power project on Beaver Ridge moved to within a hair’s breadth of approval Wednesday, Nov. 29.

FREEDOM — After considering a proposal to build a wind turbine farm on Beaver Ridge for three hours on Wednesday evening the planning board called it a night and will pick up where it left off at its next regularly scheduled meeting. “We still have a lot more to do,” said Nancy Bailey-Farrar, the board’s chairwoman.

FREEDOM — The planning board could decide as soon as this evening whether to give the green light to a proposal to install wind turbines on Beaver Ridge. The board, which closed public input earlier this month, will meet at 6:30 p.m. at the Congregational Church.

A $12 million project to erect three tower-mounted electrical power-generation turbines on wind-swept Beaver Ridge in Freedom weathered three and a half hours of maneuvering Monday night by people on both sides of the controversial issue before a cautious town planning board finally voted to close the public hearing and cease accepting further information.

Under close questioning by Bangor attorney Edmond Bearor, lawyer for the family of Selectman Steve Bennett, a representative of Competitive Energy Services of Portland was unable to provide definitive answers to several questions about the proposed wind-power project on Beaver Ridge. Bearor attended a Monday, Nov. 20 meeting of the Planning Board to represent the family of Bennett, which owns land abutting the site where CES is proposing to build three, 400-foot wind turbines.

Unable to give definitive answers to abutters’ specific questions about a proposed wind turbine project, Andy Price asked nervous landowners at Monday night’s planning board public hearing to trust him. “Whatever obstacles there are, I’m sure we can overcome them,” said Price, who represents Portland-based Competitive Energy Services LLC, the company that hopes to erect the three nearly 400-foot wind turbines on Beaver Ridge. But Price’s assurance did little to appease abutter Steve Bennett.

FREEDOM -- Residents will have a final chance to voice their opinions on a proposed windpower farm during Monday's meeting at the Congregational Church. The Planning Board public hearing on the project, which is scheduled for 6:30 p.m., was originally scheduled Nov. 9.

FREEDOM — Residents will have a final chance to voice their opinions on a proposed windpower farm during Monday’s meeting at the Congregation Church. The planning board’s public hearing on the proposed project, which is scheduled for 6:30 p.m., was originally scheduled for Nov. 9. That meeting was postponed when officials determined abutters had not been properly notified. Portland-based Competitive Energy Services LLC hopes to construct three wind turbines on Beaver Ridge.

Working toward an end-of-the-year deadline to complete construction of a 28-turbine wind farm on Mars Hill Mountain, contractors have completed more than half of the towers and expect to start generating electricity before Dec. 31. Of the 28 windmills that will be erected in developer Evergreen Wind Power’s project, 15 were complete by Friday and outfitted with blades. “We are in the process of commissioning the turbines. We anticipate we will meet our goal of actual power generation before the end of 2006,” project officials said in a statement.

The Freedom Planning Board postponed its final public hearing on a controversial, $12 million wind power project to ensure that all abutting property owners received adequate notice of the meeting. The possibility the matter could end up in court has spurred the board to take a cautious approach as it moves toward a decision on the Beaver Ridge project.

Opposition to a proposed wind turbine project at Beaver Ridge in Freedom is not dissipating even after a majority of voters decided at the end of August they weren’t interested in holding up the now $12 million electrical generation project to re-examine a newly adopted commercial development review ordinance that would govern local permitting. With first an informal group of townspeople who are opposed to the project and, just last week, the town itself turning to professional legal help, a planning board hearing scheduled for Thursday of this week promises to be a forum where local passions pro and con could be ignited. The hearing will begin at 6:30 p.m. at the town offices.