Opinions
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General or Utah
Without Kessel, the offshore wind farm's leading advocate, to shepherd it through the Power Authority, the project quickly lost momentum, just like a spinning turbine when the wind suddenly turns calm. And there were plenty of forces pushing against the project.
Leaving aside the questionable economics, inefficiency and massive tax subsidies required to induce investment in wind turbines, there are several other concrete -- and local -- reasons why the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors should vote against an ordinance allowing and encouraging industrial-scale wind turbines.
Wind farms: the monuments to lunacy that will be left to blot the landscape
September 10, 2011 in Telegraph.co.uk
September 10, 2011 in Telegraph.co.uk
Alas, despite all the practical evidence to show why wind power is one of the greatest follies of our age, those who rule our lives, from our own politicians and officials here in Britain to those above them in Brussels, seem quite impervious to the facts.
Some of you may be aware that the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin appointed a committee of experts to create statewide wind siting rules, but may not know the majority of that committee benefits financially from the wind industry.
In 2010, Town Meeting eliminated the need for a special permit for turbine construction, along with legally required notification of immediate abutters, and the holding of public hearings. The amended bylaw essentially makes it easier for turbine construction in locations that residents would likely oppose, namely, close to their homes.
Also filed under [
General|
Massachusetts]
The gigantic public investments in green energy may be stimulating innovation and helping the environment. But they are not evidence that the government knows how to create private-sector jobs. ...There's a wealth of other evidence to suggest that the green economy will not be a short-term jobs machine.
Wind energy promoters and enablers are finally waking up to the possibility that the public knows there may be adverse effects from wind power.
That puts them about 25 years behind the rest of the country, at least that part of the country that does not fall to its knees when the word "green" is attached to a concept, no matter how inaccurately.
Also filed under [
General|
Washington]
The state is spending billions on projects that focus on wind energy rather than on conventional generation capacity. Consumers will soon be paying for new transmission lines that are being built solely so that the subsidy-dependent wind-energy profiteers can move electricity ...Further, consider what might be happening had the state kept the $6.79 billion it's now spending on wind-energy transmission lines and instead allocated it to new natural-gas-fired generators.
Also filed under [
General|
California]
Land-based wind won't offer enough power to justify its downside
August 25, 2011 in Portland Press Herald
August 25, 2011 in Portland Press Herald
"They are doing an awful lot of damage to our quality of life, our mountains. I don't think it's going to lower the cost of energy. I think in 10 years we're going to be like Sweden and Denmark and we're going to be swearing at ourselves."
Also filed under [
General|
Pennsylvania]
In Michigan's Lenawee County and near the Ohio-Indiana state line, proposals to install wind turbines are attracting organized opposition. It is easy -- but unfair -- to dismiss this as an expression of classic Not In My Back Yard sentiments. If majority opinion and market forces lead to zoning ordinances that discourage developers from operating in an area, they must be respected.
The wind-energy lobby has been masterly at garnering huge subsidies and mandates by claiming that its product is a "green" alternative to conventional electricity. But the hype has obscured a dirty little secret: When power demand is highest, wind energy's output is generally low.
The Bourne residents get no quantifiable benefits from these generating towers. Are you going to pay less for electricity? I'm not. This proposed green-energy project is strictly a for-profit proposal that enables a few people to make bundles of money. Is this a "fair and balanced" local development effort?
Also filed under [
General|
Massachusetts]
When Horizon Wind LLC made significant changes like this in their proposed Dairy Hills project in Perry, Horizon was required by state law to do a Supplemental DEIS. Why should the rules be any different for Invenergy? What possible reason could the Orangeville Town Board have to allow Invenergy to bypass correct procedure?
Obviously, the citizens of Orangeville who wish to comment on Invenergy's FEIS have in no way been given ample time or opportunity to read this massive, technical document that is still not posted completely.
T. Boone's windy misadventure and the global backlash against wind energy
July 28, 2011 in Energy Tribune
July 28, 2011 in Energy Tribune
The wind energy business is the electric sector's equivalent of the corn ethanol scam: it's an over-subsidized industry that depends wholly on taxpayer dollars to remain solvent while providing an inferior product to consumers that does little, if anything, to reduce our need for hydrocarbons or cut carbon dioxide emissions. Indeed, it only increases costs.
Those environmentalists might applaud renewable energy in the abstract, but enthusiasm sometimes fades when actual projects move off the drawing boards.
Today, 29 states and the District of Columbia mandate ambitious increases in renewable energy. New York's goal is 30 percent of the energy mix from renwables by 2015.
Turbines to the north, turbines to the south - a bad bargain
July 20, 2011 in Martha's Vineyard Times
July 20, 2011 in Martha's Vineyard Times
Mr. Kennedy's warning is no surprise, but it's urgent. The state of Massachusetts, by its administrative and legislative policies favoring uneconomic wind power generation, is putting sharp upward pressure on electricity costs.
Also filed under [
General|
Massachusetts]
Apparently the wind's gone out of the sails of the push to place wind turbines off the shores of Lake Ontario.
But there's no official word, and who can be surprised, given the secrecy with which the New York Power Authority has operated this project all along.