As wind power gains popularity, caution is in order

Wind power is gaining attention in Pennsylvania as a clean alternate source of energy.

For example, the Pennsylvania Energy Development Authority announced last month that it is looking for a few good municipalities, public authorities and school districts to generate a buzz about alternative energy.

Brought back to life by Governor Ed Rendell after years of inactivity, PEDA recently awarded a $193,000 grant to Southwest Windpower to place 15 small, advanced technology wind turbines in highly visible locations across the state, the agency said in an announcement, adding that each of the turbines will generate enough electricity to power a typical residence -- and get people thinking about adopting alternative energy sources in their homes and businesses.

PEDA and Southwest Windpower, the world’s largest producer of small wind turbines, are inviting Pennsylvania municipalities, public authorities and school districts to apply to participate in the PEDA Small-Scale Community Wind Project, according to the announcement.

Larger projects also are in the works elsewhere in the state and much of northeast Pennsylvania has been classified as having good wind-energy potential. As we said in this space more than a year ago, unlike most Northeastern states, Pennsylvania has consistent wind patterns and abundant land to harness that wind for electricity. The state already has five wind farms producing 129 megawatts of electricity, or enough to power almost 40,000 households - including the 43-unit wind farm in Wayne County - by far the most of any state east of the Mississippi River. Two more wind farms are scheduled to open…

What’s more, at least one small, private turbine already operates in Bradford County. And Ridgebury Township recently decided to look into an ordinance to regulate the siting and operation of windmills.

We favor the development of alternate sources of energy, including wind power, but care must be taken. Environmental, aesthetic and other issues loom. A piece in the Harrisburg Pattriot-News address the issue:

Wind turbines with a capacity to generate 153 megawatts of electricity have been built and are operating in Pennsylvania, making it the leading wind-energy state in the East.

And that’s just for starters. Under the state’s Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard, which mandates that 18 percent of all retail energy generated in the commonwealth by 2020 come from clean, efficient and alternative resources, it is predicted that between 3,000 and 4,000 megawatts of wind capacity will be built in coming years.

That’s a lot of wind turbines, machines that can be as tall as 450 feet from base to the tip of the blade. The energy they produce is clean, renewable and priced competitively with conventional fuels, but windmills are not without visual, noise and other environmental impacts.

A group of stakeholders recently devised a model wind energy-siting ordinance that municipalities may adopt to guide them as wind farm projects emerge as another important issue with which local officials must grapple. While we commend this effort, it makes very limited distinctions about where wind turbines can and can’t be placed.

Municipalities, in our view, would be unwise to adopt this ordinance in a manner that makes windmill farms a “permitted use.” That would effectively open the door to building them in just about any situation, potentially to the community’s grief. Municipalities would better serve their residents by crafting an ordinance that allows officials some measure of subjectivity about siting or, failing that, which requires a higher degree of specific criteria that the developer must meet to win a permit.

Most helpful would be a statewide guide for windmill sitings. Currently, there’s little to prevent a developer from erecting a windmill farm just about anywhere. And if that’s the state’s operating theory, considerable conflict lies ahead, as can be seen in the controversy stirred by Mayor Stephen R. Reed’s proposal to allow 30 or more windmills to be built on the ridge tops above the city’s DeHart Reservoir, adjacent to one of the last large roadless areas in eastern Pennsylvania.

Such conflicts are not the best way to boost this potentially significant energy source. Plastering the ridge tops of Pennsylvania with windmills is eventually going to outrage residents who value the beauty of this state and value the birds, bats and other critters that travel along the ridges, for whom windmills pose a threat.

It’s simply not in the best interest of the industry, the public and the environment to place massive windmills across the commonwealth without ground rules about where they can be appropriately built with the least amount of negative impact. This would be a good task for the State Planning Board, reactivated in July 2004 (but not heard from since) by Gov. Ed Rendell to work on “specific development and conservation issues that are vital to the present and future welfare of the state.”

This is one of those vital issues that needs attention.