Vermont wind companies inflate emissions displacement by hundreds

First Wind/UPC:
"The Sheffield wind farm [40 MW] is projected to produce 115,000,000 kilowatt hours of electric energy annually [33% c.f.]. ... Based on data recently published by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (U.S. EPA) Emissions and Generation Resource Integrated Database (E-GRID), traditional Upstate New York generation sources producing an equivalent annual amount of electric energy would emit Greenhouse Gases (GHG) consisting of nearly 52,000 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) and 50 tons of nitrogen oxide (NOx)."

Kingdom Community Wind Farm (Ira):
"A wind farm the size being evaluated [42 MW] holds the potential to meet the annual electrical needs of approximately 15,000 average Vermont households ... On average, the American Wind Energy Association has estimated that each megawatt of wind capacity displaces 1,800 tons of CO2 per year given the current mix of generation fuels, indicating that on average a 42 megawatt KCW facility would displace over 75,000 tons of CO2 per year."

It is notable that neither of these companies uses emissions figures from Vermont in describing the effect on emissions of their proposed Vermont wind energy facilities. Leaving aside for now the optimistic projection of production (the existing Searsburg facility has an output of only 21% of its capacity, not 33%), how much emissions are released by the generation of 115,000 MWh of electricity in Vermont?

According to the Energy Information Administration, U.S. Dept. of Energy, in its State Electricity Profiles 2006, Vermont releases 3 pounds of CO2 per MWh generated, 0.2 pound NOx, and no SO2.

So 115,000 MWh of electricity generated in Vermont releases 172.5 tons of CO2, 11.5 tons of NOx, and no SO2.

That's a lot less potential displacement than 52,000 or 75,000 tons of CO2. These companies are exaggerating the theoretic effect by 300 to 400 times!

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism, Vermont

10 short reasons to not be excited about wind power

In answer to a recent speech by Lester Brown, as reported in National Geographic's Energy Blog, a correspondent sends these 10 succinct reasons why wind power is undesirable:

1. It can not meaningfully replace more reliable sources, currently fueled by hydro, fossil fuels, or nuclear. Because wind is intermittent, highly variable, and nondispatchable, the rest of the grid must continue to operate as if it is not there. Large-scale batteries are very far from practicality and would provide only short-term mitigation of variability.

2. It can not meaningfully reduce carbon emissions. In addition to the reasons in (1), wind forces the grid to operate less efficiently, like switching from highway to city driving.

3. It requires huge machines spread over huge areas. Even "good" wind is a diffuse resource to capture.

4. It subjects rural and wild land to industrial development. For the reasons in (3), that's where the space is, and besides the turbines themselves, heavy-duty roads, transfer stations, and high-voltage transmission lines are needed.

5. It destroys, degrades, and fragments wildlife habitat. Again, This is for the reasons in (3) and (4).

6. It is a particular threat to migratory birds, raptors, and bats. These animals already use the wind, and the giant turbine blades are a direct physical danger or force the animals to detour or go elsewhere.

7. Its giant turbine blades create a disturbing thumping or deep swishing noise as they pass through different layers of air. The noises from large wind turbines make many people sick, and other animals are likely affected similarly.

8. It requires blasting on mountain ridges to create level platforms of 2-3 acres or more and wide slow-turning roads.

9. It adversely affects water headlands and runoff when built on mountain ridges. This is not only by the construction (blasting and compacting) of the roads and platforms, but also by the clearance of vegetation for them, as well as for the transfer stations and transmission lines.

10. It's ugly. Industrial wind turbines are now typically well over 400 feet tall and easily dominate the landscape, especially when the blades are turning. And a single facility consists of a lot more than 1, from dozens on mountain ridges to hundreds in the prairies, spread over miles.

wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, wind farms, environment, environmentalism

"Oceans of fluids"

An ad for Frontier Pro Services in the October 2008 issue of North American Windpower:

Running a wind farm is a massive task.
Scores of turbines, thousands of tons of metal and fiberglass, oceans of fluids. How does anyone keep up with it! ...

Protecting your assets is the most important job you have, and Frontier Pro Services is here to help.

Gearbox servicing
Fluids sampling
Oil and hydraulics changes
Blade repairs
Scheduled maintenance

Frontier Pro Servics
They keep your moneymakers spinning.

wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, wind farms, environment, environmentalism

NO industrial wind turbines in National Forest

Dear Bob Bayer, Project Coordinator, USDA Forest Service --

Please do not allow the construction of industrial wind turbines on National Forest lands in Readsboro, Vt., as proposed by PPM Energy.

Such construction would be a permanent loss of the land for any other purpose. It would require acres of clearing for each turbine, new heavy-duty roads, and excavation (including blasting) for steel-reinforced concrete bases that would remain in the ground forever.

The motion and consequent noise and vibration of the giant turbines are a threat to flying animals -- birds, bats, and insects -- and would disturb the lives of animals on and in the ground.

Their height and required safety lighting would adversely transform the character of a rare natural landscape.

These and other impacts far outweigh the potential benefit of the facility as a source of nonpolluting renewable energy.

As you know, wind energy is highly variable, intermittent, and nondispatchable. Thus, integrating it into the grid is problematic.

Other sources must be kept available to balance the infeed from wind. They may continue to burn fuel in standby mode, burn fuel at lower efficiency in a ramped down state, or burn extra fuel in more frequent starts.

The beneficial effect of wind as a clean source of energy is therefore substantially diminished as a supplier to the grid.

In many cases, the infeed from wind may simply be absorbed as a tolerable variation in line voltage, thus not displacing any other source at all.

In sum, forest land and habitat should not be sacrificed for such a negligible potential benefit that will not measurably alter our energy use.

Reject the proposal of siting wind turbines in the National Forest.

The forest is not renewable.

wind power, wind energy, wind farms, wind turbines, environment, environmentalism, human rights, animal rights, Vermont

New York Times portraying big wind more truthfully?

Today's New York Times included to pictures with a wind turbine. The illustration by Guido Scarabottolo accompanying "The End of the Financial World as We Know It" by Michael Lewis and David Einhorn in the Week in Review section includes an industrial wind turbine as part of the system of financial shenanigans of the past decades:



And in the front news section, the continuation of the front-page article on Obama's intended aid to workers includes a photo by Larry W. Smith for the European Pressphoto Agency of a wind turbine in Kansas, clearly establishing it as an industrial construction and suggesting its futility in the shadow of established truck and car transport:



wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, wind farms, environment, environmentalism

Clarity from Greenpeace U.K.

From the Greenpeace e-bulletin, Jan. 17, 2008:

Electricity is not the same as energy. The majority of our energy demand
is for heat and transport. While nuclear power currently accounts for
about a fifth of our electricity generation, that is less than 4% of our
total energy demand.

86% of our oil and gas consumption is used for purposes other than
electricity. Most of the gas we use is for heating and hot water, or for
industrial purposes. Virtually all oil is used for transport. In this
instance, new nuclear power - which can only generate electricity - is
practically irrelevant.

There are real solutions though.

The real solutions to the energy gap and climate change are available
now. Energy efficiency, cleaner use of fossil fuels, renewables and
state of the art decentralised power stations like they have in
Scandinavia.

We can also decrease our oil dependence by improving vehicle efficiency,
public transport systems and reducing the need to travel, especially for
business by using new technology like video conferencing.

Let us hope such a clear view about nuclear power as "practically irrelevant" in fighting global warming extends to industrial wind power, which is even more so.

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism

Maori landscape saved from industrial wind development

Press Release from The Maori Party (New Zealand), via National Wind Watch (also see related news story):

The Maori Party has today welcomed the findings of the Environment Court in ruling against the erection of 37 turbines along Te Waka Range skyline on the Napier-Taupo Road.

“The site of the Te Waka –Titiohanga-Maungaharuru range is a distinctive feature of the Hawkes Bay” said Maori Party Co-leader, Dr Pita Sharples. “It creates an unique skyline which has great value as a landform, as a recreation resource, and a milestone landmark”.

“I am sure that the Prime Minister, as Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage would appreciate how landscapes of such exquisite beauty, feed the soul and nourish the spirit” said Dr Sharples.

“Importantly, it is also of great significance to the peoples of Ngati Tukuru of Ngati Kahungunu” said Dr Sharples. “The Maungahururu Ridge recalls the journey of the Takitimu Canoe, is a navigation aid, and a traditional source of kereru (wood pigeon).

“The naming of ‘Te Waka’ reflects its appearance as the shape of the waka on the skyline” added Dr Sharples. “There are values and stories associated with this landscape which our people hold great meaning by”.

“The land is also of special value to the Hineuru people of Tuwharetoa, the descendants of whom still occupy this land” said Dr Sharples.

“We are pleased that the relationship Ngati Kahungunu and Tuwharetoa have with their ancestral lands, waahi tapu and other taonga has been acknowledged in this decision”

The Maori Party is also pleased that the Environment Court has recognised the national importance of protecting outstanding natural features and landscapes (as required by Section 6 of the Resource Management Act 1991).

“Judge Thompson has carefully considered the adverse effects of the visual pollution that would dominate the Te Waka landscape and balanced this, and the important ancestral beliefs of mana whenua, alongside the benefits of establishing alternative energy sources” said Dr Sharples.

“These landscapes are of importance to all New Zealanders” said Dr Sharples.

“While we must all do what we can to look at renewable energy resources, the Environment Court has, on balance, respected the views of Ngati Kahungunu and Tuwharetoa, the advice of landscape specialists, and the local Hawkes Bay community in reaching their decision”.

Dr Pita Sharples, Co-leader, Maori Party

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism, human rights

Saying "yes" to wind — or a new hat

Richard Sullivan, Massachusetts' Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs, wrote in the Cape Cod Times, April 19, 2011:

Saying "yes" to wind energy is a vote against polluted air, energy insecurity, and climate change — and an affirmation of our commitment to environmental stewardship and sustainable economic growth.

In the same vein, I could say:

Saying "yes" to a new hat is a vote against cancer, bullying, and social injustice — and an affirmation of our commitment to gardening and thrift.

And I would be expected to justify this remarkable claim. I might be able to argue that psychologically a new hat symbolizes those votes and affirmations, but if the hat cost a couple million dollars and caused birds and bats to fall out of the air and my neighbors to fall sick and required everyone else to buy other hats to counter the effects of my hat, then I would be expected to show real evidence supporting my claim.

The same is true with industrial wind power, which does indeed exist in the real world of nature, the power grid, and people. If you claim that wind energy reduces polluted air, energy insecurity, and climate change, then you must provide the evidence not only of such benefits, but also that the degree of its achievement of such benefits is not outweighed by its adverse impacts.

Remarkably, with decades of data, the people saying "yes" to wind energy have yet to provide such evidence.

Their vote is non sequitur. Therefore, its defense is necessarily ad populum, its reply to critics necessarily ad hominem.

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism

A million homes ... sometimes. And minus other users.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has announced the approval of the biggest fucking wind energy facility in the country which will take up 350 square miles of Wyoming. Salazar said it will provide the electricity for 1,000,000 homes.

What he did not make clear is that the output of this 3-gigawatt facility will average the average energy use of 1 million homes. That it will actually provide that much energy only 40% of the time. That those times will not necessarily coincide with actual need. And that residential use represents less than 40% of electricity demand.

But if he said that, it would probably be too obvious how ridiculous it is to spend $4.5 billion, and how criminal to industrialize 350 square miles of open land, for an energy source that doesn't really work.

wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, wind farms, environment, environmentalism

New transmission lines needed to shunt wind around

From the Union for the Co-ordination of Transmission of Electricity Transmission Development Plan, 2008 (click title of this post):

The amount and location of wind generation capacity is important for transmission network development issues, because highly volatile power output (between maximal rated power and almost nil when wind conditions are unfavourable) is inherent to this generation process, with a typical associated load factor much lower than that of thermal units. In addition, regarding the location, new wind farms are usually located in areas with poor transmission networks, so new lines and infrastructure need to be planned in order to be able to evacuate this generation capacity. The consequence is that highly contrasted and variable power flows can be experienced on the transmission network, particularly if the wind farms are concentrated in neighbouring areas.

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

Wind energy to offset emissions from cows

Cows belch and fart methane, a gas with 25 times the greenhouse effect as carbon dioxide. It was calculated elsewhere that in Vermont, installing 1 megawatt of wind power would have the equivalent effect on greenhouse gas emissions as removing 0.4 of a cow from the state, that the effect of the 145 MW of approved new wind projects on four ridgelines would be like removing 58 cows.

So how much wind power would have to be erected to offset the greenhouse gas emissions of all 150,000 of Vermont's cows?

375,000 MW. 125,000 turbines the size of the 21 planned for Lowell Mountain.

wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, wind farms, environment, environmentalism, vegetarianism, Vermont

Dreams of 20% penetration

Carl Levesque of the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) writes in Renewable Energy Access (Nov. 7, 2007):

AWEA Policy Director Rob Gramlich provided a glimpse of the 20% vision technical report that is due to come out soon. The vision, which Gramlich emphasized assumes "stable and long-term policy," calls for a ramp-up in deployment of wind power capacity form the current 3,000-4,000 megawatts (MW) annually to 16,000 MW per year at peak. Gramlich also showed the conceptual map developed by American Electric Power of a grid that can efficiently accommodate 20% wind (as well as benefit all of the electric industry). The map calls for up to 15,000 miles of new transmission lines.

That's one new giant turbine every hour for the next 25 years (allowing 3 years to get up to that rate). In addition to the proposed 15,000 miles of new high-capacity transmission lines (mostly in rural and wild areas), 400,000 MW of new wind turbines would require 20,000,000 acres (31,250 square miles!) of newly industrialized land.

And since demand will also grow, all those wind turbines will have barely reached 10% "penetration" -- god save us from 20%! And, as well explained elsewhere, they will have done nothing to reduce the consumption of other fuels or their emissions.

Continuing this boondoggle is clearly madness. Enlarging it is sociopathic.

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism, human rights, animal rights,

More about extreme wind turbine noise

Farmers Weekly, 12 January 2007, p. 10, has an article about the Davies, a farming couple in Lincolnshire who have had to sleep away from their home 60 nights since September, because of the Deeping St Nicholas wind energy facility 3,000 feet from their home (see the excerpts from forum posts by "wiggyjane" posted yesterday). The article is accompanied by a sidebar:

The Wind Turbine Noise Working Group has been asked by the DTI [U.K. Department of Trade and Industry] to provide expert advice and guidance on issues surrounding what has become known as Amplitude Modulation of Aerodynamic Noise.

This is a low-frequency whooshing sound caused by the passage of air over turbine blades under certain atmospheric conditions. So far, little is known about the phenomenon or how it might be controlled.

Because amplitude modulation is difficult to predict, it is often not until a turbine is erected and fully working that the noise becomes evident. An acoustics expert, who asked not to be named, said that, although rare, it was becoming more common.

"The concern is that bigger, more modern turbines may be more prone to this problem," he told Farmers Weekly. ...

Because of the nature of sites required for wind farms, turbines are often in areas of low background noise which makes the noise of the blades all the more noticeable -- especially for rural residents used to peace and quiet.

Last month, noise worries contributed to the withdrawal of an application to build three turbines at Weston, Herfordshire. Noise has also been an issue for residents living near wind farms at Bears Down, North Cornwall and Askham, Cumbria.

wind power, wind energy, wind farms, wind turbines, environment, environmentalism

Wind turbine noise and wildlife

"Impacts of turbine noise on wildlife are essentially unknown. Mechanical noise from turbines is minimal, dissipates rapidly with increasing distance from the source, and is unlikely to impact wildlife behavior. Aerodynamic noise, which varies with the ratio of blade tip speed to wind speed, can be transmitted over considerable distances; sound waves from multiple turbines can combine to amplify the sound in the area of intersection (so noise is greater at a distance from the turbines than along the turbine string itself); and sound waves can bounce off neighboring mountains in unpredictable ways, increasing noise levels in unpredictable locations. The potential for interference with predator-prey relationships and vocal communication of birds during courtship and breeding indicate a need for additional investigation at existing wind energy facilities before this project moves forward."

--Audubon Society of New Hampshire, Feb. 27, 2009, letter to Site Evaluation Committee concerning proposed wind turbines in northern N.H.

wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, wind farms, environment, environmentalism, animal rights

Save the Rupert River from hydro and wind power

To members of the Save the Rupert coalition:

I am in complete solidarity with your opposition to yet more destruction of the James Bay region by Hydro-Québec.

I must, however, note that wind power, although it certainly should have been mentioned in the EIA, is not a viable or desirable alternative.

And like big hydro, which was initially considered to be green and turned out not to be, big wind is not green, either.

At $1.5 million per installed megawatt, the alternative wind projects represent perhaps 3,000 megawatts of nameplate capacity. The American Wind Energy Association's "rule of thumb" for onshore wind turbines is that they require 60 acres of clearance for every installed megawatt.

So the alternative to a 135-square-mile hydro reservoir would be 280 square miles of wind turbines.

Along with the impacts of clearing, heavy-duty roads, and massive steel and concrete platforms, the environmental toll would continue with a broad spectrum of noise that disturbs wildlife (and people), and blades sweeping up to 2 acres of vertical airspace at tip speeds of 150-200 mph that kill substantial numbers of birds, bats, and insects.

The adverse impacts of large-scale wind power are increasingly documented, including by some of the groups in the Save The Rupert coalition. Again, like big hydro, big wind can no longer be thought of as green.

Furthermore, wind is an intermittent and variable energy source, which requires balancing by other sources. The ideal partner for wind is hydro. In fact, wind is likely the reason for the Rupert River project. Hydro-Québec recently called for offers to provide 2,000 megawatts of wind power (they received almost 8,000 MW of proposals). If those projects were to be built, adding to the hundreds of megawatts already installed in Québec, they would need new balancing power from another source.

Thus the company's need for new hydro capacity -- not to provide needed electricity (which, as you say, is not in fact necessary), but to make wind viable so that they can profit from the unwarranted perception that it is a green alternative.

Again, wind is not an alternative to the Rupert River project but the reason for it.

I join you in opposing this latest assault on wilderness. And hope that you also oppose the same assault by wind power projects.

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism, human rights, animal rights

Wind energy development for the challenged

In June, the New England Wind Forum, a "Wind Powering America Project" of the U.S. Department of Energy Wind and Water Power Program, interviewed a few people involved in wind energy development in the region about the challenges faced by the industry.

Patrick Quinlan, former associate director of the Wind Energy Center at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, describes the overarching issue as the collision of global benefits versus local impacts, a question of eschewing wind energy for its intrusive alteration of the landscape or accept it for the generalized societal benefits. Among the examples of this conflict from different state government departments to local governments to involved residents is this: "From opponents we hear concerns for birds and bats interactions, while we hear from proponents about the benefits of reduced mercury pollution and acidification of habitats."

While this sounds like a balanced approach seeking to reconcile global benefits and local impacts, one side relies on anproven premise: that there are in fact global, or even merely statewide, benefits to building giant wind turbines in as yet undisturbed landscapes. There is no argument that the impacts of such development are significant — not only to the landscape, but also to the animals, including humans, living in it. But the benefits at best remain theoretical. In reality, after decades of experience, the effects of such a diffuse, intermittent, and variable source of energy as wind on the larger pattern of energy use remain doubtful.

Treating wind as if it has a proven record of having something to offer necessarily leads to dishonest processes of reconciliation. The game is rigged from the start.

Sue Jones, president of Community Energy Partners and lead facilitator for the Maine Wind Working Group, is similarly trapped in a fantasy, as revealed by her statement, "Experience from Europe and elsewhere tells us that it will take 10-14 years of education and experience living with wind turbines before it becomes generally acceptable." In fact, the opposite is true. Regions with more experience of industrial wind know the problems, especially as the towers and facilities continue to metastasize. Denmark, for example, now has very strict rules that, along with fierce local opposition, have effectively ended onshore development.

It would seem that she is actually hoping to get as much wind erected as possible before, as in Denmark, it becomes truly impossible. Although she speaks about educating people, her plans rely on their general inexperience and keeping them ignorant.

Only Kenneth Payne, administrator of the State of Rhode Island Office of Energy Resources, approaches reality in dealing with wind energy development: "Right now the image of 'wind energy' is loaded with symbolic value. Call to mind the image of a wind turbine in an advertisement in a periodical — does that image speak to how people actually live in our region? The transition from symbolic value to practical value is critical." And it is the practical value that is still a matter of debate.

On the matter of impacts, Dave Lamont, director for regulated utility planning at the Vermont Department of Public Service, is candid:

Regarding "how" to deploy wind energy, impacts of siting are the most critical issues. These siting issues most often boil down to visual impacts, noise impacts, and habitat impacts. Because of their size and the fact that in New England wind resources are found mostly on ridgelines, turbines are generally located in visually prominent places. This creates aesthetic issues for those in the surrounding area. While there are some areas with exposures that allow the turbines to be only partially visible from most locations, many sites have strong visibility from many locations. There are limited mitigation measures available — painting the turbines a color that blends in or selecting a lighting system that is radar activated. These measures help but don't hide the turbines.

The second critical issue is noise impacts. This seems to be an evolving issue for which there is a shortage of good information. While the higher-pitched sounds are muffled by distance and the rustling of the wind, it seems that low pitch and frequency noises from the larger rotating parts are also present. There can be some mitigation with insulation, but is that sufficient?

Finally, habitat seems to be a critical issue for ridge-top wind projects. Higher elevations contain a more fragile ecosystem, where it is possible that access roads may traverse through bear habitat, and turbines may extend into migration routes. Due to the limited history of development in these high-elevation areas, much less is known about the impacts of construction here. This makes those in charge of managing this habitat more cautious about approving projects with such potential impacts.

But missing still is any questioning that these impacts can be balanced in analysis by meaningful benefits.

Dave Ljunquist, associate director of project development at the Connecticut Clean Energy Fund, gets back to bashing objectors as solely emotional without experience or facts. He asserts that resistance is based on what people "have heard or what they are afraid might be the case", i.e., experience and facts. Promoters like himself, on the other hand, defy experience and facts to assert only meaningless numbers and personally denigrate those who raise well founded questions. Like Sue Jones, he also supports "public education programs to familiarize the general population with the realities of wind turbine projects", by which he means more aggressive public relations programs, since the realities of wind turbine projects are precisely what drive opposition.

wind power, wind energy, wind farms, environment, environmentalism, Vermont

Ridden by the Wind

The story of industrial-scale wind energy, that is, large wind turbines connected to supply the electric grid, is the same old tale of exploitative industry, of predatory capitalism, of consumerism run riot over the concerns of nature and humanity.

Wind energy does not represent change from a consumption-driven quest of continuing dividends for the investor class. It is a change of brand, nothing more. The same people behind digging up the tar sands of Alberta, drilling in the Arctic, blasting off mountaintops for coal, fracking the ground beneath our feet for methane, mowing down the rain forests, are industrializing rural and wild landscapes with the sprawling tax shelters called wind “farms”.

Like American politics, where choice is limited to which waiter you prefer to serve you from the same Wall Street kitchen (as Huey Long described it), energy policy around the world is “all-of-the-above” with politicians pretending to position themselves against one or another source to flatter different diners. Wind energy operates entirely within that game. As the realities of large-scale wind development — the decimation of habitat, birds, bats, health of human neighbors, and more — have made it harder to sell as “green”, the industry lobby group American Wind Energy Association has strategized: “We need to create a space for the wind energy industry without defining it as an alternative to fossil fuels and coal and that goes beyond being one of many ‘renewables’” (Leadership Council and Board of Directors Meeting, Carlsbad, Calif., Nov. 2, 2011). The reality is that a consumption-based economy dependent on continued “growth” doesn't need alternatives, only more choices: all of the above, whether it works or not. And that imperative excuses all.

As Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe said on June 4, 2012, at the AWEA’s annual convention in Atlanta, “Anyone standing in the way of this industry, frankly, they’re un-American.”

Because there are “important” people making a lot of money in wind, and the opening up of previously undeveloped land will enrich them well beyond wind.

Enron invented the modern wind industry by buying the support of environmental groups for large-scale “alternative” energy and all that makes it profitable: tax avoidance schemes, public grants and loan guarantees, artificial markets for “green credits”, and laws requiring its purchase. Texas Governor George W. Bush was instrumental in getting the first of these implemented at the national level on behalf of his friend Ken Lay, Enron's CEO. Texas is the USA’s leader in wind energy development, not because of some environmentalist vision, but because of the opposite: Wind energy is just one more extractive industry, and with the collaboration of Enron's environmentalists it opens up land normally off limits to such development.

The twisted rationalizations of former environmentalists to excuse the obvious adverse impacts of industrial development in the form of wind “farms” are a study in madness, akin to the military “logic” of having to destroy a village to save it. The typical refrain from the likes of the Audubon Society or Sierra Club — when they acknowledge adverse impacts at all — is that wind energy, by its theoretical and never documented reduction of carbon emissions from other electricity sources, saves more birds etc than it kills. They cling to this even as only the latter is increasingly documented and the former is increasingly clearly not. They further flaunt their moral bankruptcy by dismissing the adverse effects as a drop in the bucket compared to all the other killers of birds etc. And they join the reactionary chorus of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in presenting their plea to shovel more public money to big energy investors as one for (“American”) jobs (at any [public] cost).

At the same time, neighbors of giant wind turbines who suffer adverse health effects are derided as hysterical or mendacious. The unsurprising acoustic effects of jumbo-jet-size turbine blades cutting through vertical air spaces of almost 2 acres are simply denied. Wind's apologists reverse cause and effect and blame the victims for publicizing noise problems even as ever larger blades are increasingly documented to generate intrusive throbbing and low-frequency noise, both of which not only disturb sleep and raise stress but are increasingly tied to direct adverse physiological and psychological effects. Yet the industry fights all efforts to set even inadequate minimum distances between turbines and homes or noise limits. The CEO of Danish wind turbine manufacturer Vestas, Ditlev Engel, wrote to the Danish Environment Minister on June 29, 2011, against such limits: “At this point you may have asked yourself why it is that Vestas does not just make changes to the wind turbines so that they produce less noise? The simple answer is that at the moment it is not technically possible to do so.” Especially because, as he goes on to note, they are planning even larger machines.

And if human neighbors are treated with such naked contempt in the mad logic of corporate profit growth, pity the wildlife whose last refuges are invaded, divided, and destroyed by big wind (and now big solar as well) — all with the blessing of many environmental groups.

Invaded, divided, and destroyed — nineteenth-century colonialism and twentieth-century globalism are now openly revived against our own communities. Just as the Spanish company Iberdrola steals farmland from the Zapotecas of Oaxaca, and the Indian company Suzlon steals forest from the Adivasis, wind developers in more “developed” countries — in Europe, North America, Australia — prey on their rural populations, pitting paid-off landowners against their neighbors, leaving bitterness and discord, a blighted landscape, shattered peace and quiet, an industrial waste land from which the limited liability companies extract what profit they can and then move on to the next marks.

Industrial wind development may not be the worst scourge on the planet, but that does not excuse it. Big wind is not separate from the rest of exploitative and extractive industry. It is not separate from the persistent efforts of the investor class to hoard for themselves more of the public wealth. It is, however, particularly evil because it presents itself as the opposite of what it is. It is not even an alternative evil: To add insult to injury, wind is not even a good way to generate electricity for the grid: Since it does not blow according to customer demand, it still has to be 100% backed up by other sources.

Break the spell! End the charade!

See the swindle for what it is. Big wind is an enemy of the planet, its animal and plant life, its people. It is a new brand in an old game whose rules were written to ensure one winner only, and it isn't you.

—Eric Rosenbloom

wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, wind farms, environment, environmentalism, human rights, animal rights, Vermont, anarchism, ecoanarchism, anarchosyndicalism

Facts and figures about Jiminy Peak wind turbine

The giant wind turbine on Jiminy Peak in the northern Berkshires has been on line for 2 months and has already broken down. At this rate, they won't even save their (our) investment, let alone the planet.

Type: General Electric 1.5-megawatt model SLE

Heights and weights
Base tower section: 72', 64.5 tons
Midsection: 85’, 47.5 tons
Top tower section: 97', 33.5 tons
Total tower: 253' (77 m), 144.5 tones
Nacelle: 12'2" high, 61.7 tons
Blade (x3): 122' long, 9'2" wide, 11.2 tons
Hub: 11' radius
Total blade assembly: 249' diam. (81 m), 134.6 tons, swept area 1.27 acres
Total: 386' (117.5 m), 236 tons

Foundation: 412 cubic yards of cement; 40' diameter; 8' deep in rock; 25 tons of reinforcing rod; 140 8’ anchor bolts

Likely output of this behemoth (when not broken down): about 325 kilowatts annually, reaching that rate or above only a third of the time, essentially idle another third of the time

See some pictures at National Wind Watch.

wind power, wind energy, wind turbines, environment, environmentalism

UPC's continuing misinformation

Your editor contributed to a report on Wednesday by Pat Bradley of New York Public Radio station WAMC. She was covering the third version of UPC's plan to erect 16 420-ft 2.5-MW wind turbines on mountain ridges overlooking historic and peaceful rural communities in remote northeast Vermont. Their moving of 2 turbines across a town line seemed to have been timed to overshadow a more dramatic development in one of those affected communities. The town of Barton voted 120-0 (yes: zero) Tuesday night to oppose the project.

In the demand for sacrifice from these communities, for utterly changing their character for very much the worse, one asks "what are we weighing here? It's very clear that wind energy is just not going to make any significant contribution to replacing fossil fuels or reducing greenhouse gas emissions."

Matt Kearns, hired flack for UPC (backed by private equity firms Madison Dearborn Partners of Chicago and D.E. Shaw of New York), calls that statement "one of the disingenuous arguments regarding wind power. One of the issues that we hear is that wind power will not provide an offset to other forms of energy generation or that somehow this won't produce a benefit in terms of the use of some other fuels. Y'know, any green electrons that you add to the grid it means that there's less need to bring on other units that are fossil fuel based."

Then where are the numbers showing a reduction of fossil fuel use due to wind power on the grid? The disingenuous argument is Kearns's, because it claims a result for which it has no data. The evidence (see, e.g., the graph from the International Energy Association of Denmark's fuel use for electricity generation from 1971 to 2003 at National Wind Watch) is clear that large-scale wind has negligible, if any, effect on other sources. This is probably because, although their electricity generation may be displaced, they either must continue burning fuel (less efficiently, i.e., less cleanly) on standby or burn more fuel (again, less efficiently) in more frequent ramping up and down or switching on and off.

Besides, in Vermont almost no electricity comes from fossil fuels.

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

Animal agriculture as climate killer

Note that organic animal farming is not much better than chemical-based and factory farming of animals. An organic meat diet adds 92% of the greenhouse gas equivalence of a "conventional" meat diet, compared with 13% by a vegan diet and 6% by an organic vegan diet.

environment, environmentalism, animal rights, vegetarianism