Wind farm news

[BT Humble]

Another fine Australian example of the NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) syndrome.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200503/s1315281.htm

Council to reject wind farm application

Queanbeyan City Council in New South Wales is expected to formally oppose the construction of a 60-turbine wind farm along the Molonglo Ridge, south of Canberra.

A decision on the application to build the wind farm will be made by the NSW Government but the council wants its views taken into account.

Councillor Tom Mavec will put forward a motion at the next meeting calling on the council to oppose the building of wind farms on ridge lines adjoining urban or rural residential areas.

"People move to these areas for particular reasons and we need to help protect that amenity," he said.

"It's fine to have wind farms and we all support wind farms and green energy, but they need to be in areas well away from places where people have moved just to live there."

[jomoco]

Just when I thought you Aussies were such a pragmatic lot in your acceptance of the need for clean energy projects, oh well, tis but a minor setback in a long term struggle. Hopefully your citizenry will recognize the hypocritic nature of the nimby attitude and its obvious short comings and will carry through on building the windfarm close to where its energy can be used efficiently.

I also hope that come election time, you vote that bloke out of office and replace him with someone more in tune with your common sense heritage.

Good luck, and be sure to let us know how it all shakes out in the end.

jomoco  USA

[johnlm]

Isnt is odd that many people look at this curtain hanging project that this Cristo guy did in New York's central park as wonderful art, and see a windfarm as an eyesore.  Seems like the more  functionally usless stuff is the more people accept it.  The dude now wants to drape curtains across the Arkansas river valley near where I live.  I remember when he did that in a canyon near Rifle Colorado back in the late 70's and as soon as a strong wind came up it shredded the curtains and he just left them to clutter up the countryside.  At least windmills make use of the wind.

rant rant rant.

john

[jomoco]

What really hurts is that they spent some twenty odd million dollars on that foolishness in New York, got gobs of publicity for free, while truly news worthy items like this wind farm being derailed in Aussie land by the very people who stand to benefit from it, is a story I knew nothing about, that is until BT so kindly posted it today.

Good Job BT!

jomoco

[ghurd]

Cell phone towers.  Now that is ugly.

Everyone has a cell phone, better reception, so nobody cares.

And the thing about dead birds!  Guy wires on towers probably kill more than the blades of a windmill.  As I was told by a man near a big guyed cell phone tower.  Racoons come from everywhere for the free diner.

G-

[pyrocasto]

hahah wind farms kill no where near alot.

wind farms have killed less that 10,000~ birds, when buildings have killed more that 55 million, according to awea at least.

http://www.awea.org/faq/tutorial/wwt_environment.html#Bird%20and%20bat%20kills%20and%20other%20effec
ts.

[Gary D]

Summerset County Pa. (US) passed a law to keep eyesore windgenerators away from the view of a few bothered homeowners. The local Electric Co-op helped mediate the law!

 As for cell phone towers, many areas have passed ordinances against ANY towers over 15 feet tall... so if you want a tv tower or a windgenny tower, you need a varance (sp). So much for private property rights in Pa.

 If you are a mining company however, you can mound dirt and subsoil, rocks, etc as high as you want.  And when you're done leave the hole for someone else to worry about... Go figure.  Gary D.

[elvin1949]

BT

go to the meetings and make some noise.

The people who make the most fuss get what is needed.sorry i am not good with words,i hope you get my drift.

later

elvin

[BT Humble]

BT

go to the meetings and make some noise.

The people who make the most fuss get what is needed.sorry i am not good with words,i hope you get my drift.

later

elvin

It's OK, the state government has the final say on it (this was just the local council).  They're not REALLY local to me anyway - this is at Queanbeyan, I live at Tarago about 60km away.  

And the Tarago wind farm IS getting built. ;-)

I guess this is a primary rason why I'm putting my enthusiasm into the solar-lighting-for-Fiji project:  it's a lot easier to get people to use renewable energy if you don't have to wean them off a grid-power teat first.

BTH