Is the Answer Blowing in the Wind?
Robert Pelletier
Published in the lake Champlain Weekly, March 29, 2007
Probably no source of alternative energy has elicited as much controversy in the North Country as wind power. Its advocates tout it as a source of clean, renewable energy with no atmospheric carbon emissions. Its detractors generally have few objections to small wind turbines to supply local demand; the objections emerge over massive wind farms with forests of 43-story tall wind turbines. Objections to proposed wind farms have cropped up near Churubusco, NY, throughout the scenic areas of the Green Mountains of Vermont, and most recently, over a 50-turbine project to be located near the historic village of Mystic, Quebec on prime agricultural land in a migratory bird flyway.
The potential impacts of wind farms are many and tangible, among them being visual pollution, decrease in local property values, noise, loss of land to build the towers, access roads and transmission lines, bird kills, "flicker" effects of the blades at sunrise and sunset, possible interference with telecommunications, and safety hazards from blade throws and ice. Even more disturbing is a joint Canadian-US study appearing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that large-scale wind farms can cause significant warming of local climate, and eventually global climate. Both sides of the wind farm debate have jumped on these findings, such as the opponents of the proposed wind farm offshore of Nantucket Island (located in front of Senator Ted Kennedy's residence). Kennedy's opposition has earned him criticism from the environmental group Greenpeace, and accusations of being a millionaire "NIMBY" (Not In My Back Yard). A co-author of the paper warned the public that while the climate warming effect of wind farms was real, if wind power eventually produced one tenth of the world's power, its climate-warming effect would be only one fifth of that from carbon-derived power. The warming effect nonetheless remains a real concern for those living in the proximity of a large wind farm.
Wind power also has societal and logistical problems. Privately-owned wind power companies are accused of targeting small, poor communities with weak zoning laws for their projects, and the placing of power generation in other than a public utility's control raises alarm bells for others. Wind power is also unreliable; in Ontario, studies by the energy think tank Energy Probe showed that wind output declined in the morning, remained flat during the hottest months, and in Alberta, that wind turbines sometimes stopped during cold snaps while energy demand peaked. Adding too much unstable wind power to an electrical grid creates the risk of cascading blackouts, prompting Alberta to place a cap of 900 megawatts from wind power to avoid destabilizing the grid.
Wind energy in North America currently accounts for a tiny proportion of electrical needs (0.4% in Canada, less than 1% in the US). Meanwhile, European countries like Denmark use wind power for up to 20% of their electricity. As fossil fuel prices continue rise (including the military cost of protecting access to oil in unstable regions), it is inevitable that wind power and other alternative energy source will increase in importance in the immediate future. However, there is no "free lunch." While wind power has its problems, so do other sources of power; such as the environmental devastation wreaked by hydroelectric dams, the unsolved problem of waste for nuclear power, and food price inflation from using corn to generate ethanol. We must temper out appetite for energy or resign ourselves to living with the consequences.
Interested in seeing what a wind farm would look like in your community? Check out http://eoliennes-infos.com
Robert Pelletier writes from Clarenceville, Quebec
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