CTFWP statement for the Press Conference in Lincoln

PRESS STATEMENT

BOWERS MOUNTAIN INDUSTRIAL WIND PROJECT

CITIZENS’ TASK FORCE ON WIND POWER

Contacts: Steve Thurston and Monique Aniel, co-chairs:

(207) 4412818 (802) 384 5267

Until 2007, Maine’s mountains, whether lofty Mt. Katahdin or lower hardwood ridges like Bowers Mountain or the ridges of Rocky Dundee seen across the lake behind me, were respected, protected and admired.

Until 2007, the Natural Resources Protection Act, enacted in 1988, provided protection for Maine’s “Great Ponds” and none can be greater than the Downeast Lakes Watershed.   The Act’s intent is “to prevent any unreasonable impact to, degradation of or destruction of the resources and to encourage their protection or enhancement.”

Until 2007, Maine residents’ health and well-being were the main concerns of the Legislature and the Maine Center for Disease Control.

This was, of course, before former Governor Baldacci rolled out the red carpet for the wind industry.

Then, in 2008 came the First Wind turbines on Mars Hill.

The citizens of Mars Hill were lulled into submission by assurances from the developer, which preceded the turbine construction:

Ÿ         Noise will not be an issue

Ÿ         The turbines are like “gentle giants”

Ÿ         You have to be within 500 feet to hear anything

Today, sixteen families living near the turbines on Mars Hill are embroiled in a lawsuit against First Wind because the noise from the turbines has robbed them of their well-being and the peaceful enjoyment of their property.

In 2008 more turbines came online in Freedom with similar unwanted consequences for the neighbors.  

More lies in Vinalhaven: 

Ÿ         Wind turbines will save the planet, reduce the cost of electricity and will save on oil consumption

More lies to voters in Roxbury:

Ÿ         Wind power will bring home our boys from Iraq

How disrespectful! How deceitful! How arrogant for wind developers to use the misery of war as an argument for their project.

But the lies have been exposed and from Rumford to Dixmont, Camden to Buckfield, Philips to Caratunk, Hope to Frankfurt; people are saying NO to turbines and YES to moratoriums and protective ordinances.

However, in the Unorganized Territories of the state, there are no zoning ordinances.   Citizens have relied on LURC to protect those territories and LURC has done its job - until very recently.

In testimony to the Governor’s Task Force on Wind Power in 2007, wind developer Robert Gardiner urged that scenic views should be ignored: 

Ÿ         “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” 

Ÿ         “My friends think turbines are awesome.” 

Ÿ         “The artist Christi would be jealous of my large kinetic sculptures on the ridges”.  

And so, the law was changed to remove nearly all scenic obstacles from the permitting process for industrial wind facilities, and to allow the defacement of Maine’s mountains - something that would never have been considered for any other industry!  Simply said, the wind industry would have never EXISTED in Maine if it did not first change the way Maine EXISTED!

For the wind industry to LIVE, Maine as we know it had to DIE!

And DEATH of a landscape is what we will see as these projects proliferate.  Look behind me and see what has been lost!  Go to Mars Hill, Freedom, Vinalhaven, Stetson and Kibby - the first wind projects to desecrate our fair state.  Lincoln Lakes had the infamous distinction of being the first sprawling industrial wind site approved under the heinous Expedited Wind Permitting statute.  Soon turbines will be spinning on Spruce Mountain in Woodstock and Record Hill in Roxbury due to the same expedited wind process.  One industry, provided carte blanche to go to any part of the state and destroy it, not for providing electricity, but purely for a financial scam of subsidies and Enron-inspired REC’s. 

Projects are planned for Bowers Mountain and nearby Dill Hill, as First Wind was granted permission to extend the Champlain Wind, LLC project into previously non-expedited Kossuth Township.  There are Met Towers everywhere, threatening to encircle the famed Grand Lakes and turning the area from the Penobscot River to the Canadian border into a vast wasteland of ridge after ridge after ridge of useless wind turbines.  All in an area that NREL classifies as “Poor” wind potential, but true Mainer’s classify as paradise.

It is the same in the western mountains of Maine.  Applications are pending near the Bigelow Range, on Saddleback in Carthage, Fletcher Mountain in Concord, Johnson Mountain in Bingham… and on and on.  If not stopped, in a few short years, no vista along the famed Appalachian Trail will be devoid of 40 story or greater wind turbines. 

The cumulative effect of the state’s goal of 2700 MW of land based wind power was ignored by the wind law because--to describe the effect of hundreds of miles of Maine’s ridges dominated by 450’ tall machines, sending pulses of noise into the valleys and flashing red strobe lights into the night sky-- would be to acknowledge the absurdity of the law itself.   It would be admitting REGULATORY MALPRACTICE. 

 The opposition is growing, however and for the past three years concerned citizens have worked:

Ÿ         to challenge the permitting process, which provides undue favoritism to the wind industry

Ÿ         to educate the public to counter the misinformation of the wind industry’s relentless propaganda, 

Ÿ         to restore the protections to our environmental laws that previously existed.

We are not alone.   At a recent Town Hall meeting in Rockport, Governor LePage had this to say about wind turbines:

"They are doing an awful lot of damage to our quality of life, our mountains," he said. "I don't think it's going to lower the cost of energy. I think in 10 years we're going to be like Sweden and Denmark and we're going to be swearing at ourselves."

Governor LePage, we could not agree more.  Now we need to ask ourselves; if we understand today the folly of this course, why do we proceed down this cul-de-sac of destruction and give away everything that creates the famed “Quality of Place” of our state?  You have the power to bring this insanity to a halt.  We beg you to do that, and we stand behind you as protectors of Maine’s majestic mountains, which are undisputedly recognized as essential to her quality of place, and to the quality of life of her citizens, not just those of us living today, but all future generations to come as well.

Monique  Aniel

steve thurston

brad blake