15 Sep NIMBY Neck – rebuttal
Contrarian’s praise for Barry Zwicker’s blunt response to opponents of his company’s 30-megawatt wind farm on Digby Neck drew fire from two of those opponents. Dan Mills argues that citizens confronted with unwanted developments should not be faulted for lacking the smooth communications chops of a professional developer.
Mr. Zwicker, you seem to say, was eloquent beyond his years. Of course, he has a product to sell. He’s a pro in his field I have no doubt. (He claims to have met and spoken with me, but that is not true.) And that’s the rub: the people who live here are not pros when it comes to this kind of stuff. I think he showed maximum disdain for the local people who he has never met.
I trust you are well intentioned in proclaiming your message about NIMBYism. [But] it was the Governments of Canada and Nova Scotia that nixed the [White’s Point] quarry. Do you think it was a bunch of NIMBYs?
Carol Littleton of Annapolis Royal also weighed in forcefully:
Like many people it appears that you have limited information about the wind turbine industry, the impoverished state of municipal councils in rural Nova Scotia leaving them vulnerable to grant-hungry developers, and the weakness of our provincial and federal departments of the environment.
In fact, definitive research on the health effects of wind turbines located closer than 2000 meters from human dwellings is still outstanding. Health experts such as Dr Robert McMurtry, ex-dean of McMaster University School of Medicine, have expressed the need for such research. Whatever combination of vibration, infra-sound , low frequency sound, visual flicker, etc., is responsible, there appears to be a small percentage of individuals who are sickened by such exposure to the extent that they feel well only when they move away from the turbines – even if they have initially welcomed such developments. This is not NIMBYism.
I would quote from Wind Power, a comprehensive manual on wind installations by Paul Gipe, an internationally known wind expert who promotes wind energy: “All wind turbines create unwanted sound, or noise. Some do so to a greater degree than others. And the sounds they produce—the swish of blades through the air, the whir of gears inside the transmission, and the hum of the generator—are typically foreign to the rural settings where wind turbines are most often used.”
He advises siting with great care and above all with the consent, foreknowledge, and acceptance of those who will live amongst them. This has NOT been the case with the Digby Neck developers Skypower/Scotian Windfields, whose disregard of the legitimate concerns of the residents have earned them the antipathy of all informed citizens. I have seen a copy of the lease they had lessors sign and it exempts the companies from all future lawsuits around noise, illness, strobing, flicker, etc. If industrial size wind turbines such as these are so benign, one has to question the ethics of such a litany of self protections. Then there is the matter of their meddling with the municipal bylaw to regulate wind power in order to avoid undue information sharing and regulation for future installations in the municipality. I too heard the radio interview which so impressed you and felt nothing but amazement at the mistruths uttered so convincingly.