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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."
Look, there is no such thing as "free" energy. There is always some price to be paid, some tradeoff. If someone out there is selling you on the perfect energy source that is the answer to all out problems with no downsides, they're selling you on something that just doesn't exist.
It's a question of what tradeoffs you think are better than others. Poll any five people on /. and I'll bet you'll get 7 different opinions as to which source(s) are most practical/safe/efficient/cost-effective. That's not to say this means they're all created equal, just an acknowledgement that none of them are anywhere close to perfect.
My own opinion is that solar, wind, and hydroelectric power are almost certainly the three cleanest and safest sources we have at present--but current practical considerations also stick them into the "can supplement, but not replace" category when compared to the dirtier and less safe sources (at least for now). I'm not so concerned with birds, fish spawning, and farmers' property values as I am the more industrial-scale waste issues that you get with coal, oil, and nuclear fission. I'm sure someone can also make the case for natural gas, thorium reactors, and fusion too--but we'll see on that. But there's always someone who's going to bitch, no matter what path(s) you take.
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
The Kennedy clan, in the lower 48, fought them because they damaged the view from their Cape Cod compound. NIMBYs are everywhere.
Vietnam Veteran / Former Postal Worker -- Use Caution When Taunting!
Several of the protesters stated that they fear for the the health of their families and that they refuse to live near wind turbines
This is the most retarded thing I've heard in the past hour.
(I've unfortunately heard a lot of stupid crap lately, so i can't claim all day or all week or whatever.)
Others fear that the value of their property will be reduced significantly by the presence of turbines.
This, however, is a legitimate concern for those who plan on selling their house.
The loss of value on the house might be compensated enough by the energy provided by the wind turbines though, though I'm unsure.
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
If the price of oil has made wind power a cost-effective alternative, then why do they need to be subsidized?
(This is similar to a statement out of the administration a couple weeks back that forcing insurance companies to cover birth control should be a non-issue, since it would save insurance companies money. If insurance companies save money by offering birth control, then why do you need to force them to do it?)
I'm glad I don't give a fuck what's on my horizon and aren't contributing to making the world worse place with entitled assholeism.
Well, at least not that kind of entitled assholeism ;)
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
FTA:
He says it's worth $, so if I offer him a hundred bucks, that's actually being really generous right?
Oh... what's that? He won't take it, because he thinks it's actually worth more?
Then it's not *REALLY* worth $0, is it?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
To the guy carrying the sign that says "my property value is now $0" I want to say: sell it to me for $1. Surely, if he truly believes the property is worthless, any money he can get from it is pure profit.
I really want to hear what are the supposed "health problems" attributed to wind turbines. Amazingly, the same people who protest wind turbines have no problem with coal plants spewing ash and sulfur dioxide on their land.
___
If you think big enough, you'll never have to do it.
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.
I don't really get this one myself. I see it a lot in the Niagara region of Ontario; farmers absolutely opposed to wind turbines as well as solar farms. They state a number of baseless reasons as mentioned above like - my favourite being health concerns. Do they think they're radioactive or something? Or that they put out electromagnetic interference akin to a neutron star? Or that the Solar farms take up valuable farm land (currently sitting unused).
Any technology has its downsides - green energy is not 100% green, nor is it any cheaper than the old-school methods of power generation - that at least is cold hard fact. What these folks don't seem to understand is that this the inevitable future. As fossil-fuel-based power generation diminishes, it has to be replaced with something and we have only so many of those "something's" that we can resort to at the current time. Wind Turbines, solar and hydro-electric plants will -have- to be built unless the protesters happens to invent a newer and better means of fulfilling 21st century power needs. It's a simple reality that they really need to endeavour to understand. In fact, if they had taken as much time to read up on it as they did to make a protest sign, they'd probably realize how silly their protest was.
I don't mean to come of as purely cynical, but usually farmers who own large swaths of otherwise undeveloped land benefit pretty significantly if they sign a lease for oil & gas drilling rights.
Maybe they are trying to protect their revenue stream. Low energy prices do have a downside. If they drop enough, energy companies may choose not to exercise their drilling leases, which means no revenue for the landowners who own them. Sure, they may receive money from the wind turbines, but oil revenue's would probably be greater.
No man is an island, But if you take a bunch of dead guys and tie them together, they make a pretty good raft.
From what I understand, many turbines are considerably louder than claimed, particularly at low frequencies. If nothing else, this could affect sleep md hence health.
In general, the sounds are not all that pleasant to live with. The make a lot more noise that most people would think until you actually get close to one or, even more, close to a whole wind farm of them. Most (but not all) people who complain about the noise of nearby trains or airports are at the disatvantage that the tracks or airport was there first. In this case, if you already have a home and someone else wants to put this unpleasant noisemaker near by, it seems that you might have some right to complain.
Imagine living in the shadow of one of these, even if only a few hours a day. You're basically sitting under a strobe light.
Headaches, epileptic seizures, etc, etc.. The same environmentalists hating on the people who don't want these are probably the guys who cant work under flourescent light because it upsets their eyes.
They also have a distracting/hypnotic effect on drivers, and there are lots of long empty stretches of road out Mount Forest way (where they are, highest point in Ontario), so they become something that helps lull drivers to sleep.
I'm in Canada, where these things are, there are valid complaints.
Also it's bullshit pork spending and is not adding any appreciable power to the grid. In fact, we already overproduce so much power we have to pay Quebec and New York to take the surplus from it.
Yeah, I'm against wasteful pork spending, even if it does make some simple-minded california liberal feel good about himself.
That's essentially what California is doing now. It isn't denominated like a tax, but the regulatory infrastructure has the same deadening effect on commerce. The unemployment rate speaks for itself.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
... is really a part of the problem. Certain elements of the public have shown themselves so braindead (as these farmers are no doubt). Yet these kinds of people don't think about the unseen long-term consequences of what is currently generating their power that is more harmful for the environment but is not easily perceived by the human mind due to the long term effects and the inability of the public to get behind anything that doesn't emotionally grab them.
The story covers people who work regularly around diesel fumes, pesticides, and animal waste protesting the safety of wind turbines.
I have no experience myself, just hear-say. Last time I was in Vermont, I spoke with someone gathering petition signatures to restrict wind farms. This person lived near a set of turbines which went up after they moved to Vermont, and felt that it was like living back in Manhattan near a subway all over again - constant hum and vibration. It's not just about sight-lines and aesthetics; there are such things as noise pollution and other practical effects which *do* cross boundaries,
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
When we finally get settled into a place of our own, up here in the windy prairie of Saskatchewan, we're intending to get an acreage or more just outside the city and put wind and solar on it. A pair of 14KW turbines and a 10KW solar array would be easily attainable, and overkill, but would ensure that on even the most dreary and becalmed day we still have power (When it's not windy, it's sunny here, though we'll probably also invest in a diesel/WVO generator, just in case those long cold winter nights leave us with a little shortfall). This would also mean we don't need natural gas for heat/cooling (Geothermal and electric under-floor heating, electric "instant heat" water). Then our municipal requirements drop to phone/internet. And the "NIMBY" price reduction for having a turbine or two on our land will be more than paid for by the self-sufficient nature, without having to sacrifice any modern luxuries. We'd even have enough excess power to put power back onto the grid for a profit (Well, we would if SaskPower had that option), and/or to run an EV.
This whole thing is actually astroturf by a competing energy company in the region. They've been going around basically stirring up the farmers and whatnot with BS about the wind turbines, posting protest signs along the country roads, etc. All with their little energy company website url at the bottom.
Don't just stand there, get that other dog!
As city dwellers, we tend to think of wind mills as majestic, beautiful sculptures that provide green energy. I used to subscribe to that idea, until I saw what happened to the Bruce Peninsula in Ontario, where there are hundreds of wind mills all over a beautiful landscape.
They are a blight!!! As far as I'm concerned, I will never visit Sauble Beach again, because I can't stand driving through that area anymore. So I definitely sympathize with these farmers, their properties have already been devalued. Notice the Ontario government did not install ANY wind mills around Huntsville and other affluent regions. I wonder why?
The same thing happened in the US and Cape Cod (?) offshore wind mills. The Kennedys were the first to oppose them.
I am not going to debate the ecological merits of windmills vs gas vs coal vs nuclear. I am a supporter of nuclear energy, and as far as I'm concerned they can build one in MY back yard rather than a wind mill. Then again, I have family members that work in the plants, and I know that the likelihood or a nuclear accident that would result in any radiation leakage in Canada is zero. While less efficient, Candu reactors are pretty much bullet proof, whether earth quakes, tsunamis or well, bullets were to hit them.
I noticed the headline said "Canadians protest wind turbines," and I thought, "That sounds really silly; I'll send it to my wife to see if she gets a laugh out of it." Then I opened up the story and saw the truth: "Canadians protest subsidization of wind turbines." There's a huge difference there, and I think it's often lost in public discourse.
I would be opposed to taking tax dollars to buy Bibles to distribute in public schools. I sure would be upset if I were misrepresented as opposing Bibles, or favoring censorship of the Bible, or some other such slant. Opposing subsidization is really, really radically different from opposing the thing being subsidized.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
I'm not sure which wing is crazier Is a Catholic teacher's union left or right wing?
I fully support wind, water and solar power. BUT as with any change, you need to manage that change. I grew up in rural Ontario, and now live in the city. There is a big perception that often the concerns of those that live in the rural Ontario (and probably all rural areas) are over looked or are somehow perceived as less important than those of their urban counterparts.
I think that the implementation of wind power in Ontario should have been better handled, more participatory both from a information and financial perspective. Done right you could have municipalities clamoring for and bidding against each other to have wind power in their area. I've seen that phenomena with garbage dumps for goodness sake.
Unfortunately now is too late for the areas that already have wind turbines. It's a bit of mass hysteria...all it takes is one person to say that the wind turbine gives them headaches and some people become worried about brain tumors! It's hard to dispel that even if all the facts are on your side. They could try doing it better in areas without turbines.
Notice we are talking about subsidies here. Wind turbines still are not turning a profit on their own. Otherwise they would not have to be subsidized. I would be fine if solar, wave or wind was close to "almost" breaking even, after factoring in some way to "store" the power for when the sun is not out or there is no wind. Then a subsidy would be to "jump start" the market.
But when the facts are that these things cost x millions to build, cost y thousands to maintain and generate z dollars worth of power, and it turns out that x + y z. Way less than Z, then someone has to absorb the cost of building power generation systems that do not turn a profit.
The person or company who builds the never to turn a profit wind turbine should eat this expense. Not the tax payers. As it stands , the turbines built 5 years ago did not turn a profit, the ones being built now are not turning a profit, the ones we will build 5 years from now will not turn a profit. What is the point of subsiding them? If it is evident that "jump starting the market" means after 10 years and they are still no where near profitable, that is the wrong market for the government to encourage.
Do you know why gas and oil are so hard to kill? Because they are cheap. Even with the rising prices, they can still be produced at a profit.
vi +
1. EVs are a small part of the market, but we need to subsidize them so they can compete with the entrenched oil monopoly.
2. Uh, oil can too be used for electricity. Anything combustible is capable of producing electricity. Natural gas is a finite resource. It *will* go up in price just as oil is now. What that time frame is I won't pretend to know. The question is do you want to wait for those prices to inevitably go up, or do you want to start investing in renewable sources that won't *ever* go up now while prices are cheap?
And of course there's the fracking issue for natural gas. I tend to like clean water and a lack of earthquakes - two things that fracking may indeed be diametrically opposed too.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
"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."
One of the problems I would have with it is that wind farms tend to fall into disrepair after they are built. Somehow the money to maintain them disappears. Imagine having this in your backyard.
Proverbs 21:19
They're in a lot more places than just Mount Forest. It's basically the Ontario government saying "We're going to line rural Ontario with wind farms, wherever we think they should go, and it doesn't matter, because nobody lives in rural Ontario. And think how good we can feel about ourselves in Toronto for using green energy to run our electric shavers while we get ready for the 15km 2 hour commute to work in our SUVs!"
"City hall" in German is "Rathaus" Kinda explains a few things......
I see hundreds and hundreds of windmills all over west Texas (there are more every time I go out), and I still think they're beautiful. They're an aesthetically pleasing symbol of our progress towards a cleaner, better society.
And then when I head to the Gulf coast I pass all the oil refineries. Fucking disgusting blight on the land.
I know which I'd rather see.
The enemies of Democracy are
And if you are too close they can be noisy
That's a total myth.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JD0v9_zV2uk
Wind turbines are not aircraft propellers.
No sig today...
Considering those, decidedly rural, municipalities are going to be sharing a portion of $1.2 BILLION in money from the turbine operators, I'd say quite a bit of money is coming their way whether it's specifically on their land or not. We're not talking about putting these in even suburban areas, we're talking about farms. Farms are large things where frankly, land values aren't part of the consideration the way they are for resorts or crowded suburbs.
"I don't like it" is being given the respect it deserves.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
Your solution advocates a
(*) technical ( ) legislative (*) market-based ( ) vigilante
approach to solving a looming energy problem. Your idea will not work. Here is why it won't work. (One or more of the following may apply to your particular idea, and it may have other flaws which used to vary from state to state or country to country before a bad federal or international law was passed.)
( ) It will be fought by entrenched fishing interests
( ) Requires immediate total cooperation from everybody at once
(*) It will be fought by entrenched energy corporations
( ) Technology doesn't work that way
(*) NIMBY Syndrome will prevent mass deployment
Specifically, your plan fails to account for:
( ) Idiots with boats
(*) Infrasound making you sick
( ) WiFi allergies
(*) Technically illiterate politicians
( ) International reluctance to engage in sweeping change
(*) Extreme stupidity on the part of people who vote
( ) A lack of support from famous Musicians and Actors
(*) Conflicting environmental interests
and the following philosophical objections may also apply:
( ) The money could be better spent curing cancer
(*) Your solution is expensive
( ) Ideas similar to yours are easy to come up with, yet none have ever been shown practical
(*) Feel-good measures do nothing to solve the problem
(*) Your solution may be politically infeasible
( ) The money could be better spent implementing [another solution]
( ) It makes life harder, not easier
Furthermore, this is what I think about you:
(*) Sorry dude, but I don't think it would work.
( ) This is a stupid idea, and you're a stupid person for suggesting it.
( ) Nice try, assh0le! I'm going to find out where you live and burn your house down!
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!