The Springwater Preservation Committee

Springwater Preservation Committee

“Just a Note”

I think it was almost three years ago that I saw a tower being built in one of Jack Bishop’s fields behind our home on Wheaton Hill.

My Wife and I took our old dog for a walk to investigate, we found a crew of men almost done assembling a tall tower. The site foreman explained to us it was a test tower for a wind farm, it had a bunch of instruments for wind speed and direction that could be downloaded with a phone call.

We were totally impressed, what a great idea, take this old potato field and harvest the wind for free electricity! We walked away pretty excited about the plan, our old German Shepherd after investigating with mostly blind eyes, mostly deaf ears and with a nose that still worked fairly well was not as impressed and lifted a leg on a guy wire as we left.

When we got home I hopped on the computer and did some snooping around; wind energy sounded like it was going to solve all our energy needs for years to come, reduce dependence on foreign oil, no more polluting coal, no more dangerous nuclear plants, and our nations farmers could put that unused farmland back to work and have a shot at a decent living again -- I was totally sold on the idea. I wanted one for my house, get off the grid, no more electric bill, might even make some money on the side.

Well it's almost 3 years passed and a lot has changed, including my views on wind energy. Only 3% of our electric comes from oil, and just over half of that is imported and, since wind energy only works 25-30 % of the time we still need polluting coal, gas and dangerous nuclear plants for the 260 days a year it's not working. I'm all for using farmland for wind energy, but not 400 ft. tall industrial turbines that can be seen for 50 miles and negatively effect neighboring property value!! Could landowners with hilltop fields take advantage of the current programs available and build their own small scale wind farm? 100% tax write-off, low interest loans with payback at 50 cents on the dollar, energy producing credits, and utility companies are required by law to buy your electric. Why lease to a big corporation for a fraction of a percent of their profit?

People have been talking about this being good for our town, just keep in mind big corporations are totally driven by profit and nothing else, corporations have been known to say anything they think you may want to hear, and change their tune in the wink of an eye if it serves them, even an outright lie.

The Proposed Bishop Industrial wind farm has a total output capacity of 23.1 megawatts, given the $5,000 per megawatt figure being used this adds up to $115,500 per year to be divided between County, Schools and the Town of Springwater, the Town's cut being somewhere around $70,000 but, is that figure based on total output capacity or actual power produced? Remember these things only operate @ 25-30% capacity. If you base the $5,000 per megawatt on that, it reduces our towns cut to about $20,000 per year -- a figure that most likely would not cover the added cost to the town. Would a multi billion dollar corporation like PPM Atlantic base a contract on an imaginary figure that is totally unrealistic? I don't think so!

Make no mistake, wind energy has a place, on a small scale if every residence had its own small wind turbine, along with solar panels, batteries to store excess power and a generator back-up it would make a REAL difference. On a large scale, place the industrial size turbines offshore, or in other uninhabited areas.

I started out being a strong proponent for wind energy, and still am under the right conditions, we just have to look long and hard at the long term impact of a project like this before we, as a town, sign over our rights to a corporation. Small towns and freedom are what this country was built on, since when does the corporate world tell us what we can and can't do?

Had I known then, what I know now, on that day we first saw the test tower I would have joined my old dog with his salute to Industrial Wind Farms.

Jon Goyette

Springwater, NY

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