Maine Voices (Donald Smith): An 82-year-old got tired of spitting into the wind, went out on a limb

Posted: December 6, 2010
Updated: Today at 1:14 AM

Maine Voices: An 82-year-old got tired of spitting into the wind, w...

By risking arrest to oppose wind power, he drew attention from media far and wide.

LINCOLN - My name is Donald Smith. I am 82 years old and a native Mainer. I am a veteran and a grandfather. I was arrested and charged with criminal trespass at the Rollins Mountain wind project site in Lincoln on Nov. 8. Five of us formed a human barricade to the site.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Donald Smith, a retiree, lives on Caribou Pond in Lincoln and is an active member of Friends of Lincoln Lakes.

Dozens of others braved the cold rainy November day to protest First Wind's project.

Many people have asked me why I did this. Good question. I hope I give good answers.

The first reason is that nobody seems to be paying attention to the negative aspects of wind power -- least of all the complacent and complicit media in Maine.

If we had just stood out there with signs, even the local reporter would likely have overlooked the event. putting myself on the line to dramatize why this project is so wrong, it caught the attention of media far and wide.

It seems that most people understand utility scale (or industrial) wind power superficially, accepting wind power as "green" and "clean" and the panacea for solving energy and climate challenges. It is the result of years of masterful propaganda by the wind industry.

ALL ABOUT SUBSIDIES

Some of us have actually done a lot of research into industrial wind and have found huge negatives. dramatically raising the visibility of the issue with the arrests, we are getting people to discover these negatives as the follow-up dialogue occurs.

I have gained insights from my research into industrial wind. The wind industry would not exist without massive government subsidies. For example, the US Energy Information Administration reports that in 2007, wind received $23.37 per megawatt hour in subsidies; the next highest subsidy was $1.59 for nuclear. Those are our tax dollars going into something that doesn't work.

We are putting up wind turbines in places where there isn't enough wind to generate electricity. Look at the NREL map of wind potential in Maine. The area around Lincoln Lakes is all white. Look at the color code and white means "poor."

My guess is wind turbines are not about generating electricity, but about selling a carbon tax in the form of renewable energy certificates, raking in production tax credits, and having the taxpayers pay the cost of construction.

Another reason I got arrested is to protest the proliferation of these industrial wind projects. I retired to live a quiet life on Caribou Pond, with a view of Rollins Mountain. That ridge will have 15 turbines, each 389 feet high. The total number of turbines will be 40 on Rollins Mountain and the ridges of Rocky Dundee.

TOO DESTRUCTIVE TO BE GREEN

An acoustics expert stated that the noise from these turbines will negatively impact hundreds of people on the lakes and nearby country roads, the same well-documented noise problems that have been experienced at Mars Hill, Freedom and Vinalhaven.

I am not a NIMBY. I don't believe these industrial machines belong anywhere in the rural landscape. Not in anyone's yard -- back, front or side.

The noise issue is just one of many. If you could see the destruction of Rollins Mountain taking place right now, you would never consider this a "green" project. The DEP would fine me if I moved a rock at my home, yet they approved ridges being blasted away and scalped. They will never be the same.

The Rollins project will blast away more than seven miles of ridges and clear-cut more than one thousand acres and install 20 miles of powerlines to tie into the grid.

That is for just one project. Without thinking through the ramifications, the Legislature in 2008 passed LD 2283, a horrible law to give favoritism to wind power. They chose an arbitrary figure of 2,700 megawatts of installed capacity by 2020, which at a generous actual output of 25 percent, ends up being just 675 megawatts of intermittent, unpredictable, unreliable power.

If Rollins is 60 megawatts, then it will mean 45 more projects like this to achieve the goal.

THE PRICE IS WAY TOO STEEP

Do the math. Based on the impact of Rollins, that means at least 315 miles of Maine ridges and mountains blasted away to install 1,800 turbines; 45,000 acres or more of carbon sequestrating forest permanently clear-cut; and 1,000 miles or more of new powerlines.

The price? Rollins' price tag of $130 million times 45 is a staggering $5.85 billion.

Why did I get arrested? To help bring forth what a folly this is and how damaging it is to Maine's environment. Wind power is bad economics and bad public policy. It is far from "green." The negative impacts of these projects on the environment and our quality of place far outweigh the pittance of good they might do for the planet.

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