Opinions
Category:
General or Impact on Wildlife
Browse in :
All
> Topics
> General (2135)
All > Topics > Impact on Wildlife (305)
All of these categories
All > Topics > Impact on Wildlife (305)
All of these categories
Chatham-Kent was fertile ground for the Liberals when rolling out their plans to populate rural Ontario with turbines ...Would eight wind turbines have been erected as close to a municipal airport in rural Ontario had the local municipality been allowed to be more involved in the turbines' location?
What's at stake here? For Wrightman and other anti-wind activists, the issue is freedom of speech and their right to fight to protect themselves and the value of their homes from the noise and other issues that come with having 500-foot-tall turbines in their neighborhoods. Regardless of your feelings about wind energy, NextEra's SLAPP suit against Wrightman should be condemned. She is simply exercising her rights.
If residents were so unhappy with the Select Board's handling of a peripheral $40,000 payment from the developer, how can they be confident their input on a multi-million dollar PILOT will be taken seriously? And how plausible is it that the public hearings would end with a PILOT that differs substantially from the one that was recently voided? The concern for us, and for many others, is that any hearing would be a mere formality.
Also filed under [
General|
New Hampshire]
Because wind power is a preferred pet of the green movement, the government is allowing it to get away with things that other companies cannot. The effective result is that the White House is creating two sets of laws: a harsh one for the oil and electricity plants that provide the majority of energy in the nation, and a loving one for its preferred class of wind-energy farms.
The death of these beautiful birds is a great loss to nature but it is against the law. So how is it that no one will be punished?
Blame the Obama administration. The Interior Department has never prosecuted or fined a wind energy company.
In 2012, taxpayers contributed $13.5 billion in addition to $5.8 billion in grants, for a mere 3.6 percent of the energy produced nationwide. And how much of that money goes to manufacturers in Europe? We then pay again for the energy produced and for the cost of backup energy.
As federal wildlife officials turn a blind eye to the wind industry's slaughter, they exercise strict enforcement when others run afoul of the law.
This opinion piece by a recently retired endangered raptor specialist at New York State's Department of Environmental Conservation does not make specific mention of wind energy, but the message directly applies.
Also filed under [
Impact on Wildlife|
New York]
The Associated Press published a thorough article ...highlighting the Department of Interior's unwillingness to hold the wind industry accountable to laws meant to protect wildlife. With over 573,000 birds killed by wind turbines each year, according to the Wildlife Society Bulletin, as well as a significant number of bats, the Department of Interior can only point to superficial and voluntary guidelines that the wind industry continues to ignore.
Also filed under [
Impact on Wildlife|
USA]
It stands to reason that if you build a wind turbine in a bird's flight path, the result will be lethal. If birds maintain a predictable flight path, such as an annual migration route, then it should be possible to avoid that flight path. But what if you want to build your wind farm between a bird's breeding place and its regular hunting grounds? That is more difficult.
If approved, the wind farm would deliver turbine impacts to 196 non-participating residences and only 23 participants. Objector petitions representing more than 170 project area landowners and 13,000 acres were filed against this project.
Small town caught in wind farm vortex pays $50,000 to settle suit over sign ordinance
May 1, 2013 in Bruce Vielmetti
May 1, 2013 in Bruce Vielmetti
Plans for more of the giant turbines have spun up a deep philosophical split between neighbors who favor or oppose wind farms. As more towers arose, so did big yard signs opposing wind energy ...On Tuesday, their attorneys, the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, announced that town and its insurers agreed to pay the couples $30,000, plus $20,000 in attorney fees.
Clive Hambler, a Lecturer in Biological and Human Sciences at Hertford College, University of Oxford, writes about the serious impact of wind turbines on bird populations in the United Kingdom, the United States and elsewhere. Other related essays at the source newsletter published by the Scottish Wild Land Group can be found at the link at the bottom of this page.
Also filed under [
Impact on Wildlife|
Impact on Birds]
Dear PUC Commissioners - Your consultant kind of missed the point
April 28, 2013 in Honolulu Civil Beat
April 28, 2013 in Honolulu Civil Beat
I just finished reading the transcript of the "open session" the Public Utilities Commission hosted last month: the format included a lively conversation between moderator Maurice Kaya (project director for Hawaii Renewable Energy Development Venture) and lawyer/consultant/"guest presenter," Scott Hempling. I am now sorry I couldn't be there, for two reasons.
If you're wondering how in the world this project could be economically viable for anybody involved - and the partners are the city of Ann Arbor; Ann Arbor Public Schools; and Wind Products, the company that estimated the output - it's all about the subsidy. The U.S. Department of Energy is ready to pony up $951,000 in taxpayer money for the $1.44 million project.
Unbiased inquiry into the facts of Cape Wind do not support any value to the project other than its profit to Mr. Gordon. Perhaps the most serious false claim in behalf of Cape Wind is that it will bring jobs to Massachusetts. New Bedford is the unfortunate setting for this claim.
Also filed under [
General|
Massachusetts]
The deeper, difficult questions to the voters are whether the project's initial community wide benefit has been realized. Whether, after turbine operation curtailment, noise tests, health testimonials, the Wind Turbine Option Process and countless town meetings, if any residual community wide benefit exists? Unfortunately, there is none. The question is no longer whether Wind I and Wind II inflict unacceptable levels of harm upon Blacksmith Shop Road or Craggy Ridge neighbors.
Cap and Trade Collapses: Even the European Parliament rejects carbon price-fixing
April 18, 2013 in Wall Street Journal
April 18, 2013 in Wall Street Journal
EU carbon permit prices have collapsed as the Continent's economic crisis curbs energy demand. Utilities and industrial firms have less need to emit CO2 above their statutory limits. Total emissions in the EU fell by nearly 10% between 2007-2011, according the most recent data. The low price of carbon allowances is good for consumers who don't have to absorb the extra regulatory cost in what they pay for energy.
If another golden eagle is killed a Technical Advisory Committee - comprised of biologists from federal and state agencies - will meet and make recommendations to the BLM about what mitigation to take, which could curtail operation of turbines or even shut down turbines.
The federal government's disparate treatment of various industries whose operations have resulted in the deaths of eagles or migratory birds has become an issue of late.
"Literal beacons of the ‘green' energy movement, giant wind turbines have been one of the renewable energy sources of choice for the U.S. government, which has spent billions of taxpayer dollars subsidizing their construction ...But high maintenance costs, high rates of failure, and fluctuating weather conditions that affect energy production render wind turbines expensive and inefficient."