Wind farm visual blight? Many don't think so.

NB: link doesn't lead to anything related...

anyways, when motoring thru northern Germany, the huge fields of wind turbines soon become about as noticeable and attractive as hydroelectric pylons anywhere else....

plus, they are murder on birds

[ 09 October 2007: Message edited by: Geneva ]

OK, easier here:
[url=http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/travel/story.html?id=324bd296-c2...

[img]http://www.rabble.ca/babble/url.gif[/img]

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Originally posted by Geneva:
[b]...when motoring thru northern Germany, the huge fields of wind turbines soon become about as noticeable and attractive as hydroelectric pylons anywhere else[/b]

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Exactly, the reason why "optics" of them should play no role, we have put up with poles, pylons and stations for years without considering the "optics" of them.

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[b]plus, they are murder on birds[/b]

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So are huge hydro lines and stations, notwithstanding what skyscrapers do to them, all of these things, again not a consideration when conserving energy and finding alternate sources.

Yes, wind turbines are such an assault on the scenery. Unlike coal and nuclear plants which are simply breathtaking.

[img]http://images.ctv.ca/archives/CTVNews/img2/200505/160_smog_gfx.jpg[/img]

[ 09 October 2007: Message edited by: Green Radical ]

Yea. Sidescroll messes up TAT and drives me nuts. Now that I know I can use an image as a link I may just make a habit of it.

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Originally posted by farnival:
[b]wel, Anne Murray and Elizabeth May would seem to be in the visual blight crowd. [img]rolleyes.gif" border="0[/img] [/b]

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Jinx! Buy me a Coke!

um, it appears i beat you by a minute michelle...and combined with the Hampton thread, you might need to buy me a pint. yar! [img]tongue.gif" border="0[/img]

(clearly on the same page though! [img]biggrin.gif" border="0[/img] )

Rural folk don't use electricity? When it is real muggy, and a smog alert has been issued, what do you think you are breathing? Is lung cancer preferable to a turbine where you live?

I live near a wind project and the landowners are paid to have turbines on their properties.

I have no problem with turbines in Toronto. If you can find room for them, and a place that's windy enough, build away!

Yumpin yimminy! There is a turbine in Toronto. Right on Lake Shore Blvd. It's the [b]BIG WHITE TWIRLY THINGAMABOB.[/b] It's not far from the CN Tower...you know...the big tall pointy thing...

Anywho (chortles) Wind farms are located after studies indicate the best place for them, wind wise. So, we have them from about half way between Copenhagen (Ont.) through to Port Burwell and as far as Long Point. And in the Shellbourne area, as the land elevation makes for great breezes. There's also three now at Ferndale, on the Bruce. Cause the wind blows best there.

Cities tend to dull the wind a bit.

I could see a time when wind turbines march into Lake Ontario to supply Toronto. They do that in Denmark, or Holland I believe; locate them off shore because the wind is good and it doesn't require land. Although there the sea might be shallower than Lake Ontario. And it costs more to build, service and hook up off shore mills, no doubt.

And eyesore? Well, maybe. But why is it all of a a sudden an issue with wind mills? What about cell phone towers? The above mentioned Hydro and telephone poles? Bill Boards? St. Thomas?

I can't understand this whining about wind turbines. They're virtually silent but for a bit of whooshing, a fairly aesthetic melding of form and funtion, elegant white curving lines. There are plenty of workarounds for the bird problem, siting to start with - don't put them in migratory routes; as for roads, they need a minimal earth track which here in Germany is usually run along the edges of fields adding no extra visual noise, the cabling buried below ground.

Whining about wind turbines is a bit like meat eaters complaining about abbatoirs. Until we stop using electricity we're going to need ways to produce it and this one is far ahead of coal, nuclear and even hydro. Obviously they put them where there is wind, duh. If it means some people suddenly have to look at them, it should also mean other people no longer have to look at places like Nanticoke, its a no-brainer.

I wonder if Life isn't simply pointing out that the windmills have almost all gone in rural areas when most of the power is consumed in urban areas. Local food fanatics take note: local power makes sense, too. You make room for the fucking windmills.

I don't live far from Port Burwell. Personally, I have no problem with the windmills. But I don't live directly by one, nor did I lease my land to one. I've heard conflicting opinions about the noise factor and the money factor.

How many of our vaunted eco-freaks in this province have bothered to take that trip to the windmills outside Port Burwell, to talk with the people on the ground?

Tommy, come now. Cities defeating the wind? I don't think that's the case. I know for a fact there's a lot of hot air blasting from the city every day. Plus I thought it was trees that slowed down winds, across vast acres, not concrete plylons and pavement.

[ 09 October 2007: Message edited by: Farmpunk ]

Sorry, FM, you suggesting that rural people use more power per capita?

I'd really have to get careless with my power useage to top twenty houses in Milton that run central air. And that's counting business electricty.

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I'm suggesting putting the subsidies towards individual generation would be far smarter and have less environmentally negative impacts.

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I agree. It would also be more secure. But that is a long way away from being a possibility.

Strangely enough I find the smoke puking out of Nanticoke a rather unpleasent sight. On a clear day you can stand underneath a windmill in Haldimand Norfolk and see the mushroom cloud from Nanticoke. When there's a clear day.

But, oh, those stacks are in a rural area, too (and close to the world biosphere region of Long Point). Never mind, my urban friends. The government will never sully your sightlines with windmills or smoke stacks. Your votes are worth too much to them.

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Originally posted by Frustrated Mess:
[b]
Yeah ... nothing's quite that complicated either. First, the roads are short, narrow, and not paved. Second, the footprint of the turbine is quite small. Third, well, golly gee, don't power lines run everywhere anyway? If you don't like powerlines move far, far away where there is no power.

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While I am a proponent of wind energy that is absolutely not true. I have the opportunity to actually see these things as I go by them almost every day. The roads are often quite long, they are built up to withstand heavy trucks and equipment and the footprint of a windmill is in fact a fair size. I would recomend people stop comparing a whack of these to the Toronto one, or what has happened elsewhere and actually have a look at what is happening in rural Ontario right now.
It does no good to pretend there are not problems with these things ranging from noise (sorry they are pretty annoying when there a several in different directions from your home), to the contracts and the liabilities of the companies. Pretending that turbines are the total answer, or that there is no environmental damage caused by them is sticking our heads in the sand.
The truth is every single form of hydro generation comes with failings, environmental issues, and benefits. Nothing is perfect, nor will it ever be unless we discover how to make energy out of belly lint or something.
I think Life makes a valuable point with which I agree. Individual generation makes a lot more sense. For some it may be wind, others solar, and for a lucky few both. They also are not confined to rural areas with wide open spaces. Why in 2007 the technology is not available for cheap, reliable solar production for my home is beyond me.
Net metering will also have the added benefit of being an incentive to conserve energy, something that no one can compel of others no matter what we enact as legislations. However, watching potential income go out the old window will be a real incentive to replace it.

Excuse me?
Is this the way you talk to rural people who happen to live near these or are you just an ass or having a bad day.
I support the development of wind generation. Have for some time. I have grown a bit uneasy seeing what is happening in my area or Huron-Bruce though it is true. Maybe it is just here, but the lanes are many, many rods long in most cases, often cutting to near the back of farms. They are not dirt paths, they are substantally built little roads. The area that is supposed to be avoided by the property owners amounts to more than an acre of land, according to the companies, not some coffee shop talk. You see I regularly attend the open houses hosted by companies to gather information because of an organizational postion I hold. There are new, rather heavy hydro lines going in, and it is true trees are being cut down to facilitate them.
Given all that I still support their use because it is better than some of the alternatives. However, talking down to people - instead of listening, realizing that it is not all sunshine and honey and that some problems are being created that need to be dealt with, is not the solution for acceptance.
Talking like an arse to someone who actually lives within the area these are being built and recognizes reality, not some textbook dream, is also a good way to start making people who are supportive question why it is some people are so sensitive - in my experience that gives the impression there is something to hide.

{edited to remove hole as that was maybe a little over the top}

[ 10 October 2007: Message edited by: Bookish Agrarian ]

So unsubstaintiated claims of being given to wild exageration and empty hyperbole was their way of being nice?

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Originally posted by Tommy_Paine:
[b]And eyesore? Well, maybe. But why is it all of a a sudden an issue with wind mills? What about cell phone towers? The above mentioned Hydro and telephone poles? Bill Boards? St. Thomas?[/b]

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Always with the cracks about St. Thomas! [img]biggrin.gif" border="0[/img]

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Talking like an arse to someone who actually lives within the area these are being built and recognizes reality,

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With all due respect, perhaps you are the arse. How do you know where I live or if I live under one, how many I have seen, or what meetings I have attended?

Clearly you are all ASSumption.

And by the way, I am on mailing lists for both sides of the argument. I too am all in favour of micro- and distributed generation. But you know what? It ain't happening.

So as much as I don't like the idea of industrial wind, it is preferable to coal and nukes although we will be getting them anyway. And if we are to criticize industrial wind, the criticism should concrete and not NIMBY-ism unless your backyard is off the grid in which case, I would fully support any and all objections.

I attended some of the carefully stage managed provincial hearings on energy. Once the lobbyists and vested interests were heard from, what was left was a handful of people who want energy, unlimited, and dirt cheap.

No one wants the brownouts, the shortages, or the infrastructure, or the smog, or the waste, or the cost. Just the energy as though it is provided by pixie dust.

Far worse visual blight would be the devastation caused by climate chaos: parched lands, permafrost turned to sludge, oceans flooding coastlines, etc. etc. etc.

So I was involved with Windshare (known as the Toronto Renewable energy Cooperative) at the time they were actively working to put the Wind Turbine in Toronto, and there's a few issues with the city, one of them being 'dirty air' meaning that the buildings create many air tunnels that shift from the natural pattern, there's migratory paths of birds that also get shifted as they fly towards the lit up buildings (which we should also be fighting to shut off at night), and of course, having a safe space around them is extremely important.

But beyond those issues Toronto and it's citizens were very much in favour, and are happy to have the first Urban Wind Turbine in north america. The silly arguements about noise (there are some noisy turbines, but the new ones create almost NO noice) the birds, the siting, all that were issues we had to deal with from people from energy companies who weren't insterested in green power, none of them were real issues.

In the end, I would take a whole string of turbines on the shorefront instead of the condos, but unfortunatly it just can't be done due to the building's creating dirty air, I'd suggest that we should work on a St. Clair hill turbine farm. That way rural folks can see that we are willing to do our part as well.

The comments about small personal power creation is 100% on though. If everyone is responsible for creating their own energy they'd have a far better understanding of how damaging some power creation is, and how less offensive the wind turbine is to having a coal smokestack in your back yard.

We should absolutely be taking the rural people's feelings into consideration. It just sometimes gets confused when someone says 'they're really loud' and then we head down to our waterfront turbine and can't hear the damned thing standing underneath it because of lakeshore blvd roaring past.

There are good ways of going about creating wind farms, and there are bad ways, but in the end, we all use power and if we want to maintain anything like the lifestyles we lead we're all going to have to sacrifice some of the 'comforts' we have.