Hello-

 

Given your past involvement in wind energy issues in Maine, I wanted to ensure that you have seen the pre-rulemaking draft of new rules related to wind energy development in Maine that DEP has just released.  You can find the link to the draft rules on our website at:

 

http://www.maine.gov/dep/comment/comment.html?id=696084

 

Please note that comments are due 8/8 to Mark Margerum. 

 

Thank you.

Mark Bergeron, P.E.

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Comment by Frank J. Heller, MPA on July 17, 2016 at 10:02am

DONE!

"

Dear Mr. Margerum:

I was one of the early consultants to local government planners on assessing the impact of wind turbines on the community, habitat and environment. Among them were the City of Portland’s planner, the towns of Brunswick and Lisbon Falls, and a conclave of planners largely from Androscoggin county.

While the issues have become more clarified and documented they remain the same…noise, flicker, night lights, bat/insect/bird kills, visual disturbance; the legislation has been crafted by lobbyists for the wind industry to avoid the most odious of impacts. Your draft, for example, while focused on scenic impact, omits consideration of the following:

  • Scenic and other impacts of access roads, the development facilitated by increased access, environmental degradation caused by increased backcountry transit using ATV’s and snow machines, and transmission lines now at the promotion of wind farm owners.
  • Scenic impact affects property values enormously. Most realtors selling/reselling vacation property estimate scenic view lines can add up to 40% on the asking price of real estate. When you lower the value of an relatively expensive property, you produce a ripple effect which ends with challenges to property tax rates and reduced income to run public schools and local government. Your guidelines need to be modified to include surveys of local realtors and tax assessors on this critical impact.
  • Transmission lines are really scars on the landscape that can go on for miles and remove, permanently, large numbers of trees that are critical for removing CO2 from the atmosphere. I personally witnessed the scar in Woodstock for one R.O.W. which appeared to be several hundred feet wide and removed mature trees. Your legislation ignores this massive negative impact on climate change; an impact so great the U.S. forest research service has developed and validated software, iTREE, ECO to measure the impact of one tree on the atmosphere and on a watershed, iTREE, HYDRO. Apparently, D.E.P is blind to the use of this technology, to measure these ‘tangible benefits’ despite it being free.
  • To make matters even worse, clear cuts for transmission lines are sprayed with herbicides permanently reducing the ability of regrowth in removing CO2—let me add that trees remove other pollutants, retains water that becomes run-off exacerbating storm water flooding, and kills root masses which purify rain water affecting public water supplies. Then there is the impact of the herbicides and the lack of a policy found in other environmental legislation to provide a suitable offset for the loss---i.e.  acquiring land elsewhere and replanting a comparable forest.
  • Your rules do not measure these environmental impacts, a shocking oversight when you consider that the cumulative impact of removing the trees may well offset any carbon credits. This is a deliberate omission crafted into legislation by lobbyists who have contaminated once pristine environmental groups like the SIERRA CLUB with ‘donations’.  

It is time to measure the total impact on both the environment and the community; you’ve selectively engineered draft rules which omit this impact…do we have to sue you to get this done or will you live up to the overall mandate of the Legislature to keep Maine a wilderness state and not a power generator for the rest of New England?

If you have questions, or need documentation, please call or write me.

V.T.Y.

Frank J. Heller, MPA

12 Belmont St.

Brunswick, Maine 04011-3004

207.729.6090/1590."

 

Maine as Third World Country:

CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power

 

Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.

Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT

******** IF LINKS BELOW DON'T WORK, GOOGLE THEM*********

(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/

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We have the facts on our side. We have the truth on our side. All we need now is YOU.

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Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law

Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future

"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."

https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/

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