Significant changes to the proposed New Grange Wind Farm's transmission line location plans require a Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Study be prepared. The Arkwright Town Board learned Monday about this supplemental report from Robert Adams, a consulting engineer with Conestoga-Rovers, the company reviewing the DEIS filed by Horizon Wind Energy for the town.

A longtime landowner and farmer reproached the town board Monday for its apparent opposition to commercial wind tower construction. ...Orleans County Legislator and environmentalist Gary Kent respectfully rebuked Dudley's comments, as did a a handful of local and county residents. The price of hosting wind turbines will be diminished property values, Kent said. He cited his recent visit to Naples, N.Y., where a real estate agent told him that homes are selling for tens of thousands of dollars below their assessed value since the wind farms started going up. If turbines go up in Orleans County, he bets the same will happen here, too.

The Town Board recently agreed to collaborate on a letter to the state attorney general asking his office to intervene in a conflict between a Naples property owner and a company that plans to build a wind farm in Prattsburgh. The board wants the attorney general to require that windmills be set back far enough from the town line to allow Naples homeowners full use of their property.

After a public hearing on a proposed local wind energy facilities law Wednesday, the town board put off voting on its adoption. Trustees will discuss the issue at a special work session at a date to be announced, Supervisor Mark Chamberlain said. ...the board has written a new version establishing wind energy tower restrictions for the general health, welfare and safety of its residents, Chamberlain said. ..."It started out as four sentences. It is now 24 pages," Chamberlain said. "It talks about many aspects of wind energy conversion."

Over 50 residents attended the first public hearing, making known there concerns about the possibility of large wind turbines affecting the town's scenery, noise levels and quality of life. Many residents spoke out against the turbines, fearing that passing a law allowing smaller turbines would open the door for commercial wind farms to create facilities in the town. The vagueness of the law, they said, did not limit the turbine's height or power output.

The town approved an 80-foot windmill, but Fuller needs the tower at least 20 feet higher to produce enough energy to qualify for a grant program with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority. ...In June, the Planning Board approved the first residential windmill in Gorham, a tower up to 140 feet high on a farm on Jones Road over looking Canandaigua Lake. Owner Jack Schilbe knew his proposed windmill had to be at least 100 feet high to produce enough wind energy to power his 100-acre farm. He asked that additional footage be added to his proposal to give him more latitude to qualify for grant money.

A new local law on wind energy conversion systems was approved Monday by the Hanover Town Board. The wind energy legislation will govern equipment, location and the process for obtaining necessary permits for wind towers. Town Attorney Jeffrey Passafaro said there is no application currently on file and that any company wishing to establish a wind farm would be required to conduct an environmental study and apply for all the necessary permits.

The action was carried out in a vote of 4 to 1, with council members Kenneth Bochmann, Henry Harper, Dennis Lewis, and Supervisor Gary Sargent voting yes, leaving Councilwoman Varsi Peterson casting the lone nay. ...It was a benchmark moment for property owners involved in a wind turbine energy project, planned for development by First Wind, formerly UPC Wind Management. However, Peterson warned that the board's failure to increase wind tower setbacks before the zoning law was adopted could lead to "serious problems" later on.

As residents and the town board in Enfield anticipate a wind farm and board members in the Town of Ithaca work out potential legislation, Newfield's Town Board passed a 180-day moratorium on windmills effective through the end of the year. "It became clear we needed to educate ourselves about wind power," said Richard Driscoll, a 30-year resident of Newfield and the newest town board member. The Newfield board was unanimous in approving the moratorium at its July 10 meeting, he said.

Babcock & Brown has submitted a Draft Scoping Document to the Towns of Westfield and Ripley as part of the State Environmental Quality Review (SEQR) process for the proposed Ripley-Westfield Wind Farm. Comments on the Draft Scoping Document will be heard at two public scoping meetings scheduled for next Tuesday, July 29th. The first meeting will take place from 1 to 3 p.m. at the Westfield Academy and Central School District auditorium. The second meeting will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. at Meeder's Restaurant in Ripley.

The Holland Board of Public Works has a few more hurdles to jump before it can start putting up wind turbines around town. The Zoning Board of Appeals will today review a request to install a meteorological tower at Windmill Island Gardens. In 12 to 18 months, the BPW could install a wind turbine. A proposal to install three residential-sized turbines on the roof of the Civic Center, 150 W. Eighth St., would require special permission from the city's planning commission.

The Evans Town Board has delayed discussion on three wind energy laws that would regulate both commercial and noncommercial facilities. ...Although the board received communications from the town Planning Board indicating strong support of the proposed laws, two residents voiced concerns over their language. ...Frank Hotchkiss of Waterman Road supported Henry, saying that ambiguity in the law's language could deter wind energy manufacturers from doing business in Evans.

At least two companies are interested in offshore wind development in New York's Great Lakes waters - BQ Energy, which developed Lackawanna's Steel Winds, and AWS Truewind. "I don't think it's inevitable, but I think it's very likely," said Bruce Bailey, AWS Truewind's president. There are significant obstacles and unknowns. ...Installing wind turbines in water can be at least twice as expensive because of the cost of mobilizing marine crews, the specialized nature of the installation equipment and the turbines and the need to move the power onshore, experts say. And that doesn't factor in what would be necessary to deal with the ice that often covers the eastern end of Lake Erie in winter.

The Lackawanna Planning Board Thursday approved site plans for the second phase of the Steel Winds turbine project along Route 5. The approval paves the way for 13 additional turbines to be erected on the property, on which 11 of the turbines would be located further inland, roughly midway between the Lake Erie shoreline and Route 5 on the old Bethlehem Steel site. The developer, Clipper Windpower, first broke ground in 2005 on the $40 million wind-energy project, erecting eight turbines along the lake shore after agreeing to pay the city $100,000 annually over the next 15 years.

According to information presented to the town board, the planning board will be submitting the cultural mitigation suggestions to the councilmen and Highway Superintendent Anthony Clark will be reviewing the road use agreement. The planning board also is working on the decommissioning and site restoration plan, to spell out what will be done when the lifespan of the turbines is complete.

The Enfield Town Board held off on a vote Wednesday on wind-farm developer John Rancich's proposed developer's agreement in order to send it back to the town attorney to get a stronger agreement. Town Supervisor Frank Podufalski said from what he's seen and heard, a local wind law and a developer's agreement are used during wind farm projects, so asking Guy Krogh, the town attorney, to strengthen the agreement would allow the town board to comfortably approve it down the road. Krogh expressed concerns over several portions of the agreement, most notably that the town has yet to adopt a local wind law.

The Shell WindEnergy group met with a group of Scipio landowners on Monday at the Auburn Masonic Temple to discuss issues on which they disagreed, according to Batman. "In the initial lease that Shell showed the landowners, all legal rights went to Shell. It was a big problem," he said. "Shell has economic concerns and proprietary technology that it's not willing to give away." Batman said that they now seem more willing to discuss the landowners' concerns. He said that there was sufficient information for the town to move ahead and consider forming an advisory group.

The Zoning Board of Appeals has unanimously granted Dr. Daniel Melamed an area variance to erect a 135-foot-tall wind turbine at his sheep and goat farm. The many neighbors who packed the Town Hall to voice their opposition to the wind turbine over the several-month-long public hearing were absent from the final session Tuesday night, July 8. The meeting lasted about 15 minutes. After the meeting, Dr. Melamed told The Independent that he was pleased by the ZBA decision. "Hopefully, the entire discussion has raised the consciousness of the county about wind power in general," he said.

Town officials introduced a new local law to regulate the construction of wind energy conversion systems in Hanover. At a recent Hanover Town Board meeting, a public hearing was held for an updated local law regulating WECS - to replace the former local law from 2006 - in anticipation of the upcoming Ball Hill Windpark joint project with the town of Villenova through Noble Power. ...Setback revisions require all commercial WECS to be 500 feet from the nearest property line, right-of-way, easement, power line, public road, as well as 500 feet from gas wells, and gas and electric distribution lines. They must be 1,000 feet from the nearest residential dwelling, school, church or historical structure existing at the time of application, and 100 feet from state-identified wetlands.