Anarchy

Ever reviled, accursed, ne'er understood, Thou art the grisly terror of our age. "Wreck of all order," cry the multitude, "Art thou, & war & murder's endless rage." O, let them cry. To them that ne'er have striven The 'truth that lies behind a word to find, To them the word's right meaning was not given. They shall continue blind among the blind. But thou, O word, so clear, so strong, so true, Thou sayest all which I for goal have taken. I give thee to the future! Thine secure When each at least unto himself shall waken. Comes it in sunshine? In the tempest's thrill? I cannot tell -- but it the earth shall see! I am an Anarchist! Wherefore I will Not rule, & also ruled I will not be! -- John Henry Mackay (born Feb. 6, 1864)

tags:  anarchism, ecoanarchism, anarchosyndicalism

Wind turbine noise -- a primer

A good overview of the wind turbine noise issue, written by physician Nina Pierpont, is available at www.aweo.org/Pierpont-noise-060204.pdf (40 KB). She explains the difference between A-weighted and C-weighted sound measurements and presents evidence that the C-weighted sound level from industrial wind turbines is much greater than the usually cited A-weighted level. The C-weighting includes more low-frequency sound, which can have a serious impact on quality of life and even health.

Pierpont also puts the sound levels of wind turbines and their impact into the context of current environmental and health guidelines.

tags:  wind power, wind energy, wind farms, wind turbines, environment

$100,000 per minute

That's what the Department of Defense says the U.S. is spending on the occupation of Iraq: $4,500,000,000 per month.

That's $54,000,000,000 per year, but Bush just asked for $120,000,000,000 more from Congress for the rest of 2006, most of it for the Iraq operation. It is estimated that $250,000,000,000 has already been spent for Iraq since the invasion in March 2003, almost three years ago.

So it looks like the cost is more like twice what the DD says: $200,000 per minute, $300,000,000 per day, $9,000,000,000 per month.

If you're going to destroy a country, it obviously requires a hell of a lot of cash to do a thorough job of it. Sacrifice is demanded from all of us.

Republicans endorse instant runoff voting

The U.S. House Republicans used runoff voting to ensure that their leader represents the choice of a majority of those voting. The first vote they had, with four candidates, put Roy Blunt well ahead of everyone with 110 votes to John Boehner's 79. But there were also 40 votes for John Shadegg and 2 for Jim Ryun, denying Blunt a majority and forcing an immediate runoff between the two top-polling candidates. After that, Boehner won 122 to 109.

Rather than being spoilers in the simple-minded vote process of most elections in the U.S., Shadegg and Ryun's candidacies served to show the broader support for a candidate other than Blount. A runoff vote recognized that and allowed the majority to select the candidate better reflecting the majority's choice.

Instant runoff voting is a version in which voters mark their second and third choices as well as their first. When no candidate winds a majority in the first choices, then the votes for the lowest-polling candidate are removed and those voters' second-choice votes are counted instead. This is done again if a third round is needed to determine a majority choice.

While the House Republicans endorse runoff voting in their own tightknit club, both the Republican and the Democratic parties fight it for wider elections. As with their barring of other candidates from presidential debates, the two major parties are more interested in maintaining their shared monopoly on power than in engaing in the democratic process. Their worst nightmare is people being free to vote their conscience.

tags:  Vermont

Tons of conrete, blasting of bedrock for small wind turbine

From "Tons of concrete, massive bolts to secure windmill to earth" (East Bay (R.I.) Newspapers, Feb. 2), here is a description of the platform for a relatively small 660-KW Vestas V47 wind turbine. Its total height will be 241 feet (tower 164', blades 77'), 100-180 feet shorter than models currently being pushed for utility grids (and not singly, as in this case, but in groups of dozens, sometimes hundreds.

This is going into the grounds of the Portsmouth Abbey School, who think they are going to get half of their electricity from the turbine. They are looking at the projected average output, however, ignoring the fact that a wind turbine generates at or above its average rate only a third of the time. And much of that time is likely to be when there is low demand.

Of course, they will still be connected to the grid, and any mismatch of supply and demand will be handled there. The school may gain some savings from net metering, at the expense of other customers on the system.

... The ingredients for that base rolled into the school aboard caravans of trucks. Twenty mixer trucks full of cement and eighty 27-foot long by one-inch diameter steel rods all sunk through bedrock in a 30-foot deep hole should keep the turbine firmly tethered to earth.

... Halfway down they struck rock, "solid rock all the rest of the way down."

The school located a licensed blasting company which agreed to take on the job. ...

Next, a 15-foot diameter corrugated steel pipe, of the sort used in drainage systems, was lowered into the hole and an outer two-foot ring of cement (120 cubic yards worth) was poured between the pipe and the bedrock to form an outer shell.

A team of laborers, among them Brother Joseph, Paul Jestings, the school's director of operations, and Henry duPont, ("Our wind turbine expert from Block Island") climbed down into the hole and threaded the 80 heavy threaded rods into their templates. It is to these rods that the turbine tower will be bolted.

Another corrugated pipe, this one narrower at 13-feet, was lowered into the hole and filled to the top with dirt. Then the two-foot space between the two pipes was filled with 80 yards of concrete, effectively sandwiching the bolts in solid concrete. The whole thing was capped with reinforced concrete and, once cured, will provide an immovable foundation for the turbine to come. ...

It seems rather a lot to put up with for such an intermittent and variable source of power.

tags:  wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, environment, environmentalism

National Wind Watch cautions wind energy does not meet Bush's 2006 Agenda objectives

[press release]

Rowe, MA (February 3, 2006). National Wind Watch, Inc., an organization dedicated to providing the facts about wind energy, welcomed President Bush's call this week to become less reliant on foreign oil for America's energy needs. The organization agrees advances in technology are essential, but warns further appropriations for wind energy would be a distraction from Bush's defined energy objectives.

National Wind Watch president, David Roberson, stated, "Wind is not a reliable form of energy and, as such, cannot replace traditional modes of electricity generation. And industrial wind development will not meet the criteria outlined in Bush's 2006 Agenda," referring to the objectives of reducing fuel prices and US dependence on foreign oil. "The simple fact is wind can do little to eliminate our need for foreign oil, because less than 3% of our oil consumption is used in electricity generation," Mr. Roberson noted. He added that rural America is facing an onslaught of wind energy proposals that could result in thousands of industrial towers, many standing over 400-feet high, and thousands of miles of associated transmission lines. At best wind will deliver only small amounts of electricity at a high cost. "In the face of rising energy prices, our federal, state, and local governments are grasping at wind energy as the solution to energy independence, but wind only increases both our economic and environmental costs," Roberson said. "The mission of National Wind Watch is to help educate communities and decision makers on the realities of wind."

tags:  wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism

Hush money from wind company

Here are excerpts from a "forbearance and non-disturbance agreement" being foisted on owners of property neighboring a large wind power facility.

... Company and Owner have determined that it is in their mutual best interest to enter into this forbearance and non-disturbance agreement. The Company is desirous of providing Owner with certain economic benefits to accrue from operation of the Wind Project ... Owner understands and accepts that operation of wind turbine generators may have some impacts on the Wind Project's neighbors, including the Owner's Property.

... Owners irrevocably grant to the Company, its successors and assigns, the right and privilege to operate the Wind Project, which activity may result in visual, television, noise and other impacts and disturbances at the Property. Owners agree, among other things, that during operation of the Wind Project the Company may occasionally generate and maintain audible noise levels in excess of fifty (50) db (A) on and above the Property at certain times of the day or night. Owners also agree to not engage in any activity on the Property that might cause interference with the operation of teh Wind Project. ...

Owners may sell, mortgage, assign or convey the Property without consent of Company, but any conveyance shall be subject to the terms of this Agreement.

... Owners understand and agree that the Easements and agreements granted herein shall run with the Property, and that any assignee or future buyer of the Property will take the Property subject to the obligations herein. The terms of the Easements and forbearance agreements granted hereunder shall commence upon the execution of this Agreement, and shall terminate forty years after ...

Owners agree to keep this Agreement confidential and shall not disclose to any third party any of the terms of this Agreement ...

The Company shall pay Owner an ... operations easement payment in the amount of $--- per year ...

Note that the 40-year "agreement" is so above board that the signer is required to keep it secret!

From a later letter to owners still holding out, a "one-time $1,500 payment as a partial offset to some of the visual impacts of [the transmission line]" is offered which the manager of the wind power company says he "may have neglected to mention ... before." He also proposes to keep feeding them money until they sign the "forbearance agreement."

tags:  wind power, wind energy, wind farms, Vermont