Number of turbines reduced, but area landowners 'generally don’t like these things’
RAISSA TETANISH
Amherst Daily News
AMHERST – With many residents along the Gulf Shore opposed to the idea, a 17-turbine wind farm for the area was recently granted a development permit.
Originally, the proposed Pugwash Wind Farm was planned with up to 30 turbines, but scaled back to 17 after concerns from some of the area residents.
“The main reason we scaled it back would be in order to move it back (from the shoreline),” said Clair Peers, director of Cobequid Area Wind Farms Inc., a joint venture company owned by Atlantic Wind Power Corporation Ltd. and Cobequid Wind Power Inc.
Cumberland County Municipality has a bylaw in place restricting wind turbines to be placed within 500 meters, or three times the turbine height, from a residence. Cobequid Wind Farms Inc. took the bylaw one step further.
“Even though we were in compliance with the bylaw at 500, because there was still a lot of concern with them being too close, and people were asking for as much as a kilometre, we said that when we would scale it back, we would look at that, and we did,” Peers said, noting one of the property owners negotiating with the company backed out, leaving them with less property.
Following the development permit approval, Peers met with several people with concerns, including Lisa Betts.
“Certainly the people who were meeting with (Peers) made it very clear that even this amended project was not what we were looking for,” said Betts.
“By trying to move a few turbines back by a few hundred meters is not paying attention to what we are saying — that this affects the whole neighborhood, not just the immediate people.”
Betts said the wind farm will affect everyone, directly or indirectly.
“It is our contention that people generally don’t like these things and certainly wouldn’t choose to build a house or retirement home, or come on holidays to an area that has these things flapping around in the background.
“This is ultimately going to affect our economy.”
Although the project has been granted a development permit, a buyer for the power has yet to come on board. Peers says Cobequid Wind Farms Inc. did not make an application with Nova Scotia Power for this project.
“We felt the timing was not right and that we were not suitably prepared. We took the extra time to revisit our plans and make some adjustments,” he said.
“We were really unsettled with the public consultation process. There were a lot of unhappy people and we weren’t sure what the real consensus was with the property owners here.”
Next for the project, says Peers, is another public consultation with property owners involved. He acknowledges a petition started by Betts and other concerned residents, but feels surveying the property owners will paint a better picture for the company’s purposes and the purpose of the environmental assessment.
Betts says of the 1,200 signatures on the petition, those that didn’t sign in opposition to any wind farm, not just the amended proposal, are those property owners involved, their friends and neighbours.
“Of all the people that live in the area and live along the Gulf Shore, we have about 70 to 80 per cent that don’t want this wind power. Take those (property owners, friends and neighbours) out of the picture and the percentage gets even higher,” Betts said.
http://www.amherstdaily.com/index.cfm?sid=168968&sc=58
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3 comments:
Rather than engaging in the ongoing soap opera with Cobequid, has anyone ever considered a class action suit for lost revenue, i.e. property values/sales, against the County? Think about it. Who is liable? Who made the decision that will translate into the loss of likely millions of dollars?
If Council was to receive a shot across the bow via a letter on legal letterhead, dollars to donuts, they might crumble like a poorly baked cake.
Also, is going full-scale political in this, an election year, an option?
When County Council received a lawyer drafted letter outlining area residents' concern and opposition to this project they promptly came back with a cease and desist order of their own, as in they would not meet, engage or communicate with opponents fearing anything said would be used against them in court. THe opponents then dropped the lawyer in efforts to show willing to get a resolution outside court. That effort resoundly failed, Council so far has backed the developer 100% and remains deaf to residents concerns and opposition.
Anonymous, okay, thank you for that info. The opponents made a concrete gesture of good faith by dropping their legal innitiative in the hope of opening dialogue away from the courts...which was promptly shat upon by Council. This is my understanding of what has happened.
So maybe that was the wrong decision to make. The opponents were expecting reasonable conduct on the part of Council, only to be awakened to the reality of its postition, i.e. "Council so far has backed the developer 100%."
By issuing a cease-and-desist, it would seem to me that Council was/is on the defensive. If Council is aware of that or not, who cares? Does the option exist to re-visit legally and up the ante?
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