Local authors and outdoor enthusiasts Kirk Kardashian and Stephen Gorman make the arguments for and against windpower in Vermont.

Pro Wind Power
Kirk Kardashian

Concessions first! Maybe we should be having this discussion in Texas, where 17 new coal-fired power plants are in the offing. If built, they will emit the equivalent amount of carbon dioxide per year as 19 million SUVs. Texas, where the vast supply of wind is only matched by the vastness of the state. Texas, whose city of Houston competes with Los Angeles for the title of America's Most Smoggy. And Texas, the 46th healthiest state in the Union.

But Vermont? Its very nickname-The Green Mountain State-proclaims both its environmental attitude and its stubborn topography, the same topography that makes wind-power seem impractical. And besides, we don't have a single coal power plant. Eighty-five percent of our electricity is generated without fossil fuel. Our carbon footprint is but a dainty lady's slipper in a nation of moonboots. To top it off, we're consistently rated one of the most healthy states around.

So why are we having this debate, and what does health have to do with it? Well, things are not quite as rosy as they appear. Over a third of our electricity comes from a nuclear reactor that's scheduled to be decommissioned in five years. Another third comes from Hydro-Quebec, whose contract with Vermont expires in 2015. Yet the Department of Public Service claims that our electricity consumption will increase 16 percent over the next eight years. How will we confront those numbers? In a world waking up to the specter of global warming, and as residents of a state poised to lose large parts of its identity and economy in a new climate, it is our duty to take corrective action in every way we can.

And this is where the health part comes in. Vermonters like to recreate outside. We hike, ski, bike, paddle, walk, run, snowshoe, climb, camp and swim, just to name a few. We use our mountains and rivers-free, renewable resources-to achieve physical fitness and mental health. Wind power is a different riff on the same tune. Wind-also a free, renewable resource-aids us in achieving the imperative of energy production. We should easily recognize that baseline and start bobbing our heads to it.

In fact, we've already begun to get in the groove. Vermont currently has one wind farm, located in Searsburg. Since 1997, Green Mountain Power's 11 turbines have been spinning out six megawatts of juice per year-enough energy to power six thousand homes in New England. However, those wind turbines use ten-year-old technology, and only produce a fraction of what the new turbines can generate. A project slated for Sheffield, Vermont, has 26 turbines, each with a capacity of two megawatts. If the plan goes through, it will prevent the emission of 80,000 tons of carbon-dioxide annually.

That's just the tip of the (melting) iceberg. The Vermont Energy Research Associates have discovered the potential for 6000 megawatts of wind-power in Vermont, not including sites on or near public lands, national forests, or within spitting distance of the Long Trail. True, the spine of the Green Mountains provides the best theoretical possibility for wind generation, but there are 517 miles of ridgelines above 2,500 feet. Using just 46 of those miles for 74 wind turbines could account for 20 percent of Vermont's total
electrical needs.

Then consider the local economic benefits. The Sheffield Wind Farm would pay $400,000 per year in property taxes, reducing the town tax rate by 55 percent. It's no wonder Sheffield voters gave it the thumbs-up.

For a moment, though, let's forget about all the wattage and cash that wind farms can pump into Vermont, while replacing dirty fossil fuel with clean energy. That's the easy part, right? We Vermonters don't just like to get outside, we like the vertical relief of our hills and mountains broken only by the sky and sun, in all their pastel shades, right? Actually, a statewide poll for Renewable Energy Vermont found that 81 percent of respondents would "consider wind turbines on Vermont mountain ridges beautiful or acceptable." That sentiment is a ripple in the wake of the Searsburg project, where the public acceptance of the wind farm increased after it was built. Once people realized the environmental benefits of wind power, the previously unsightly turbines became acceptable. Also, more than inanimate cell phone towers poorly disguised as trees, windmills allow people to see utility with every blade rotation.

That doesn't mean we should set Camels Hump abristle with wind turbines. But ridgelines that are already developed, such as those at ski areas, have great potential for high power with minimal additional disturbance. Wouldn't it be nice to know that the chairlift you're riding is being powered by the windmill at the top of the hill? The Appalachian Mountain Club thinks so, regarding "land with existing infrastructure" as "most suitable" for wind power.

Sometimes the hardest part about exercising is overcoming your inertia. Once you drag yourself off the couch and go, you don't regret it. Vermont has wind power inertia-we need to stop wasting time, and get out there.

Kirk Kardashian is a lawyer and writer who lives with his wife in Woodstock. He communes with nature on his bikes and skis. He can be reached at kckardashian@yahoo.com.

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Anti Wind Power
Stephen Gorman

As a writer and photographer, my mission is to promote knowledge and understanding about the earth and its natural history through words, images and ideas that convey a passion for nature and a sense of wonder about our planet. My most recent book is Wild New England, a Celebration of Our Region's Natural Beauty. My next book, to be released this spring, is Thoreau's New England. That's the Thoreau of Walden fame, who wrote: "In wildness is the preservation of the world."

Notice that he didn't say, "In transforming the last scattered remnants of wildness into giant corporate industrial wind factories for the sole benefit of General Electric, Goldman Sachs, NRG Systems, Catamount Energy, etc. and their investors is the preservation of the world."

Like many Vermonters I am an avid skier, hiker, snowshoer, paddler, hunter, fisherman, and road and mountain biker. And, like many of my fellow outdoor recreationalists who are adamantly opposed to giant corporate industrial wind, but who don't dare speak out, I was hesitant when this magazine's editor, Kate Carter, asked me to write this. Like meek lambs we have been silenced by an industry that has cynically but effectively co-opted the "green" mantle, portraying itself as "eco-friendly."

Nothing could be further from the truth. As one Northeast Kingdom resident put it recently, the wind industrialists are "venture capitalists masquerading as environmentalists. There is only one reason these projects are planned in Vermont and that is financial gain. I might add at our pain."

Right on. There is one reason these corporations exist, and only one reason: to make money for their investors. Period. Despite their rhetoric, they are not in business to make the world a better place. They are in business to make a profit. The only "green" thing about giant corporate industrial wind is the money flowing into their coffers (largely thanks to lavish government subsidies, i.e. your taxes and mine). No wonder the Catamount Energy website proclaims, "Business is brisk."

And what do we get out of it? The usual benefits of corporate colonialism: a wrecked landscape. Ruined communities. State and local economies in tatters. Slaughtered wildlife. A special place destroyed.

A friend who is actually a wind developer in Idaho told me recently, "We expect to lose the first two or three rounds when communities resist us. But by the fourth or fifth round we wear out the opposition and we end up winning." This is the same friend who jokes, "Money is the answer. Now, what was the question?"

Please see here to learn about the catastrophic costs of giant corporate industrial wind. The giant corporate industrial wind lobby wants you to think that by turning our mountaintops into industrial parks we will cut greenhouse emissions. That is not true. Giant wind turbines produce an occasional trickle of electricity, something Vermont currently obtains from non-greenhouse-gas-producing sources. Vermont produces the least CO2 of any state in the union. What CO2 you and I do produce mainly comes out of the tailpipes of our cars-something we can address without destroying our mountains.

Vermont currently obtains about 75 percent of its electricity from non-CO2-emitting Vermont Yankee and Hydro Quebec. The remainder comes from a variety of non-CO2-producing sources, such as local hydro and wood. Another 20-30 percent of our electricity could come from existing non-CO2-producing hydro plants on the Connecticut River that are currently sending the power to Massachusetts. However, this surplus is likely unnecessary as Vermont officials estimate that we can easily reduce our current electric usage by 30 percent through efficiency programs.

So any additional electricity that giant corporate industrial wind managed to squeeze out of our mountaintops would merely be excess power added to the New England grid, where it would end up fueling the wretched excess of our consumer culture: big box stores, suburban sprawl, the ghastly concrete and glass auto-centric wastelands in Massachusetts and Connecticut.

Another thing that giant corporate industrial wind doesn't want you to know is that even if you covered the Green Mountains with Boeing 747-sized turbines from Massachusetts to Quebec, or the entire Appalachians from Alabama to Newfoundland, you would not replace a single conventional power plant because wind power is so intermittent, unreliable, inefficient, and has no base-load capacity. You can't store it, and you can't depend upon it. Every kilowatt generated by wind must be backed up by a conventional source. In Germany, where there are no fewer than 14,500 industrial wind turbines, not a single fossil-fuel power station has been
decommissioned.

The biggest energy source we can tap in Vermont is conservation. We do not need more electric energy sources. We do need to use all our resources more efficiently. We do not need to adopt giant corporate industrial wind's attitude that we live in disposable communities in disposable landscapes. We do need to: Reduce. Reuse. Recycle. Restore. It's an old-fashioned idea that still works.

Vermont was recently ranked by the National Geographic Society as 6th among the world's most desirable destinations, selected for its unspoiled attractiveness, distinctive cultural character, and environmental stewardship. If those of us who live, work, and recreate here want to keep it this way, we need to speak out loudly against the powerful interests that threaten to destroy our home for absolutely no environmental or social benefit.

"In wildness is the preservation of the world."

Stephen Gorman's books include "Northeastern Wilds: Journeys of Discovery in the Northern Forest" and "The American Wilderness: Journeys into Distant and Historic Landscapes." He has worked on assignment for national magazines such as Audubon, Men's Journal, National Geographic publications, Discovery Channel publications, Sierra, Outside, and many others. He has a Master's degree in Environmental Studies from Yale. He and his wife live in Norwich, Vermont.