Slashdot Mirror
Canadians Protest Wind Turbines
NIK282000 writes "Ontario farmers rallied in downtown Toronto to protest the subsidization of wind turbines. Several of the protesters stated that they fear for the the health of their families and that they refuse to live near wind turbines. Others fear that the value of their property will be reduced significantly by the presence of turbines. With the cost of gas and oil on its way up it's a wonder that any one would be against the use of renewable energy sources."
Imagine your house is in the shadow of one of these things, the sun becomes a strobe light. This is the most legit criticism I've heard.
Other than it just being more pork spending, and not a real road to energy independence, ever.
Because oil is currently MASSIVELY subsidised. The tax breaks and benefits the oil industry get are huge, and if a tiny proportion of those subsidies were also available to so-called "Green" energy solutions then solar and wind power would be free, paid for entirely by the subsidy.
I live in Toronto, a few blocks from the windmill on the lakeshore. Since the windmill went in, my home's propey value has, approximately, doubled, along with the rest of the neighborhood.. The concern is pure BS, just like the shit about windmill health issues.
Sigh. I hate to give credence to urban myths and junk science, but if you want to know of the fear of the unknown, here is a trailer for a movie that will explain it all.
http://windfallthemovie.com/index_1.html
This is only second hand, but from what I've read the noise can carry quite a ways. And one of the problems is that if you *can* hear it, its as consistent as the wind is -- which, unfortunately, is likely to be pretty consistent or why else put up one of these turbines?
Wood Shavings!
- Godai
This is actually a common misconception. That wind turbine did not "over-rev and blow itself to bits". It was a very specifically watched test to see exactly *how* a wind turbine would come apart in the event that the automatic brakes failed in a high-wind situation [in this case, if memory serves, the winds were in excess of 125 kph]. Turbines are fairly tightly controlled by software and human operators [almost always off-site], but the general consensus is that there's negligible danger in the event of a turbine destroying itself. You basically have to be standing underneath it during a hurricane, *and* have the redundant braking systems fail at the same time.
This is not to say that they're flawless and impeccably safe. But the relative danger is significantly lower than a coal plant failing, for example.
Oh, is that what this is about? Well that's even more retarded since low frequency sounds are ridiculously common and not something that should be mysterious to non-engineer/scientists.
The enemies of Democracy are
These tax breaks. Other benefits include minimum parking requirements that encourage people to use oil, and external costs of oil use (such as air pollution) that are not recovered in the price of oil.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
You are also exposed to infrasound from car traffic, household appliances, and your own beating heart. As for the intensity of the sound, there are already regulations for how close wind turbines can be placed to residences to control for this.
http://www.thestar.com/business/article/738734--wind-gets-clean-bill-of-health
Account -> Discussions -> Disable Sigs
Because oil is currently MASSIVELY subsidised. The tax breaks and benefits the oil industry get are huge, and if a tiny proportion of those subsidies were also available to so-called "Green" energy solutions then solar and wind power would be free, paid for entirely by the subsidy.
The problem comes in when we play fast and loose with semantics... to me, a subsidy is something that the gov't gives away, I guess. I don't classify a tax break (returning taxes paid into the gov't) the same way I do a subsidy. On top of that, are these not the same kinds of tax breaks received by all kinds of companies, not just oil companies? I'm not a huge fan of the oil companies and the seemingly large profits at our expense, but I AM a fan of arguing with facts...
A good friend of mine has very different political views, but sent me this link: http://money.cnn.com/2011/04/26/news/economy/oil_tax_breaks_obama/index.htm?hpt=T2
This article frames it in such a way as that the oil companies are not receiving "special treatment", per se. So how can you penalize them and say they're exempt from the tax breaks given to others? So my question is whether this CNN Money article is a piece of garbage that is also playing fast & loose with terminology, or not delivering the whole truth? I invite discussion.
I only post comments when someone on the internet is wrong.