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Letter to State Representative Kathy Pellett (D-Chester, VT) 

Your article to the Message shows you have been strongly influenced by the wind lobby. I don't say this with the intention of being rude but simply direct. Your article is repleat with their rhetoric, their flawed statistics and their irrelevant arguments

Dear Representative Pellett:

I read your recent letter to the Message with interest. Many of your Andover and other constituents could be sorely affected by the proposed industrial wind plant on Glebe/Magic Mountain as well as all Vermonters if we do not bring sensibility and education to the discussion of wind power in Vermont. Fortunately for local residents and Vermonters, we have essentially stopped the Glebe/Magic project.

I applaud your attendance at the conferences. Sadly almost all of these conferences are entirely run by wind producing firms or their economically involved advocates and consultants. There has been little representation by other and more balanced energy groups heretofore. Fortunately that is changing and knowledgeable and concerned Vermonters with an appreciation of the state’s real energy situation, as well as the significant shortcomings of wind energy, will be attending all future state and regional conferences. They will also be assisting communities that are being targeted by wind developers.

Your article to the Message shows you have been strongly influenced by the wind lobby. I don’t say this with the intention of being rude but simply direct. Your article is repleat with their rhetoric, their flawed statistics and their irrelevant arguments.

Many citizens, particularly informed ones, do seriously oppose wind energy per se. The more you know about wind energy, the less one likes it. Because it doesn’t work, doesn’t deliver, and has horrific offshoot issues of erosion, birdkill, reduced property values, health issues, loss of hunting and wildlife and increased electricity costs. These are pragmatic, disturbing issues – not just the viewshed or “siting” as the wind industry likes to call it. It’s typical of the wind industry to try to pretend that all objections to their 330 feet to 400 feet high lighted generators are merely visual. That is a further major flaw in their existence but there are enormous real substantive reasons and when confronted by these substantive reasons, such as: not reliably serving communities, the visual concerns become very serious. We are expected to give up much for nothing.

You cite renewable energy as a panacea for fossil fuels, but Vermont doesn’t use fossil fuel for electricity. That’s one of the constant and telltale misrepresentations of the wind industry in Vermont. And we don’t send $ 1 billion out of state for the purchase of Hydro-Quebec’s non-fossil fuel, renewable resource product called water. The fees are much lower and they are significantly offset by the energy we export from Vermont Yankee. There is nothing wrong with importation. This is Vermont; we are small, our economy is agro and tourism based, we cannot and must not even think about trying to produce everything we use or consume.

We are not at a crossroads in Vermont. We are doing very well on our own as one of the greenest and most energy diverse entities on the planet. But like any entity we are vulnerable to the fast-talking and slick sales approaches of the many groups that have tried to misuse Vermont for their agendas. The wind lobby is a prime example with their carrot and stick of doomsday threats coupled with the false promises of “free” wind. If we want our grandchildren to genuinely keep warm, we don’t want to place any reliance in any way on any energy pittance that wind generators will produce.

The idea that renewable energy development helps to create a strong local economy or keep energy dollars in Vermont is sheer nonsense and blatantly false propaganda as far as wind energy is concerned. Windfarms employ virtually no one and produce very modest amounts of energy and must at all times be completely and thoroughly backed up and supported by conventional plants. Hydro and biomass conversely conversely do promote local economy and do save on energy expenses. It is flagrantly misrepresentative but typical for the wind lobby to try to piggyback on those coattails.

A major part of the wind lobby’s scare tactics is that Vermont Yankee will gone. It won’t. And their suggestions that Hydo-Quebec will not be available. It will. Both the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Office of the Minister for Power have indicated their continuing and future support for their Vermont contracts and/or plants.

Your future research will be very well served by reading some of the material at the website at http://www.glebemountaingroup.org/ . The educational material here and at other sites, noted by that group, have led the citizens of Londonderry to resoundingly reject the proposal by Catamount. The Planning Commission by 7-0 researched the problems and carefully revised the Town Plan to protect the ridgeline. Repeated meetings called by the Select Board and the Commission have resulted in strong majority opposition. Town meetings are always hard to quantify without a ballot vote but the speakers and audience reaction would indicate the meetings in July, August and most recently on September 30th are all in the 90% versus 10% category – perhaps even greater. The Town of Windham has done the same. In addition a citizen’s petition with over 1500 signatures has been gathered for the Public Service Board. Local proponents of wind seem to number about 50 only.

Education through available information has brought about the realization that wind energy has very little to offer Vermont with a tremendous downside.

Sincerely,

David Hoopes

Londonderry

David Hoopes

This article is the work of the source indicated. Any opinions expressed in it are not necessarily those of National Wind Watch.

The copyright of this article resides with the author or publisher indicated. As part of its noncommercial educational effort to present the environmental, social, scientific, and economic issues of large-scale wind power development to a global audience seeking such information, National Wind Watch endeavors to observe “fair use” as provided for in section 107 of U.S. Copyright Law and similar “fair dealing” provisions of the copyright laws of other nations. Send requests to excerpt, general inquiries, and comments via e-mail.

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