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Environmental issues pertaining to a wind farm.
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Environmental issues pertaining to a wind farm Industrial wind farms are located all over the world. Some farms are favorably accepted but when they are cited in rural communities, there are complaints. We have to ask ourselves, “is wind energy a viable resource in light of the benefits and burdens of an industrial wind farm”. In this presentation we will attempt to address both positively and negatively on how a wind farm will impact land, animals and people of the Town and village of Alfred.
When a wind farm is sited in rural residential areas, they are intrusive. Noise from the wind farm at nuisance levels will affect people for about a mile away. The wind turbines themselves are large. The proposed turbines from Empire Wind are the 2 MW class turbines. They are in excess of 400 feet tall from the tip of the blade to the ground. They stand higher than the Statue of Liberty.
Each turbine’s size has more square footage than half of a football field and is larger than a Boeing 747
Typically a wind farm developer states “The area of disturbance of each windmill tower will be about one acre. The gravel roads will be a maximum width of 45 feet. Once completed, the permanent footprint of each wind turbine generator including road and associated facilities will be less than one acre per windmill site”.
It may be true that the final footprint may be one acre acre per windmill tower but the land that is cleared for the roads and the windmill tower is a lot more than this. The topsoil and subsoil is disturbed and trees are permanently removed.
Kibby Mountain, Maine. This was once undisturbed forest habitat
How much environmental damage is being done in trying to save the environment?
Sometimes the environmental damage in placing a windmill tower is large
Concrete and steel being installed. 1000 tons of concrete will be poured.
Concrete and re-bar being installed. This will be there forever.
Birds and bats perform an important role to our ecosystem. They consume insects and other insects, adding to our human comfort. They are killed by wind turbines in large numbers. Birds are killed as a result of collision with the blades, and bats because there lungs explode. They are unable to tolerate the pressure change that occurs when passing through the blades, a phenomena known as barotrauma. No one knows the numbers of birds and bats that are killed, but it appears to be significant.
Aerial view of tower that fell in Fenner, NY on the 27th of Dec ‘09
What happened to the 500 gallons of oil that was in the nocile as it slammed to the ground. No one knows what the cause was, but it was the 2nd time it happened in New york.
The tower in Fenner was only 300 feet high. The towers proposed for Alfred are 400 feet high
St. Leon Manitoba, Canada. The nearest turbine is one-half mile from house.
FAA requires lighting, which causes pulsing red or white lights at night. This light will be seen for miles.
Environmental Benefits • Two principal environmental benefits are attributed to wind farms. (1) Reduce dependence on foreign oil and(2) displace greenhouse gas emissions from conventional power plants. Whether wind energy can make a meaningful contribution to carbon emissions and reduction goals is debatable. We all want to do our share in contributing to these causes, but we must truthfully ask this question “Is our contribution toward these goals worth the possibility of jeopardizing the quality of life of all of us and the next several generation worth the price”.
With a little imagination a person could visualize a wind farm on the Village of Alfred skyline.
Alfred, NY ???????? • Our community is not typical for a properly placed industrial wind farm. From the top of the hill where the wind farm will be sited to the valley floor is only about a half mile. We have got to ask ourselves two questions. Is this to close? Will the gain outweigh the loss?
