Information for distribution

What follows is what we may mail/e-mail/otherwise distribute to inform people in the area about the proposed wind farm. Snowbirds are starting to return and are just now finding out about the wind farm. I am open to suggestions on how to tweak this. I'd like to include more information, but to fit in any more will have to make the font pretty small!. We hope to include a copy of the map with the mail-out.

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Did you know that Atlantic Wind Power Company (AWPC) plans to change the nature of your neighborhood?

The same company that put in a sometimes controversial 17 turbine wind farm in Pubnico wants to come over here and erect a 27 turbine industrial power plant that will affect our health, enjoyment of this beautiful area and significantly affect our property value, local economy and ability to develop this area as we would like it to be.

The wind farm is planned to be between MacFarlane Road westerly to Irving's dairy farm and between the Gulf Shore Road and Miller Road)

At 120m (394 feet) these turbines are huge. They will completely dominate the skyline for miles and miles.

They are noisy. On normal days they can be heard for 1-2 km. On humid, calm days they can be heard from much further away.

They set up vibrations and ultrasound which very seriously affect many people's health.

The flickering light as the sun is seen through the rotors is maddening and can induce migraines.

Some areas report large bird and bats mortality at turbines.

If this project goes ahead, cottagers and tourists will go somewhere else for their peace, quiet and beautiful beaches. Our local economy is heavily dependent on these visitors. Many move here permanently. If they stop coming, how much longer will the Co-op, the hardware stores and pharmacy last?

There is no evidence that any long term jobs will come out of this permanent project.

If this project goes ahead where will Pugwash be able to develop its community?

Once these turbines are erected, what stops the next wind power coming in and marching even more turbines into Pugwash or down to Fox Harbour?

Property prices are already being detrimentally affected. Eventually people will get used to turbines, but can you wait 20+ years for your property value to return to where it should be?

People planning on buying/building their retirement homes have canceled/put plans on hold.

We need more green power. We need to promote wind energy. Any environmentalist, renewable energy proponent or consultant would agree that as much as we need green energy sources, consideration for the existing local economy is of prime importance when deciding where these projects are located.

This is a very thinly populated County. The Cobequids are the windiest parts of the County. There are NS Power transmission lines on the Cobequids. That's where wind turbines should be.

There is already strong lack of public support for this poorly located wind farm. If it is allowed to go ahead, it will hurt the green energy movement.

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Why hasn't anyone contacted adjacent property owners?

When did AWPC know that the Gulf Shore was a potential site for a wind farm?

AWPC has been testing the winds of the Gulf Shore for 2.5 years. It only takes 12 months to collect enough data to determine if a site is suitable or not. Why is it only in the last few months that their plan has come to light?

What's been going on?

November 2004 First wind monitoring tower erected behind Brogan's. It fell and broke that day.

December 2004 Second wind monitoring tower erected

Summer 2006 Cumberland County starts the process to amend the land use bylaw to include specific setback for wind turbines.

3^rd November '06 Scotian WindFields (competitor to AWPC) held a presentation and meeting at St Thomas More church hall looking for investors.

21 November AWPC held an Open House at St Thomas More church hall. No open forum for questions.

6 December First draft of amendment presented to Cumberland County Council with a proposed turbine setback of 125% of turbine height.

21 March '07 First reading of amendment. Setback distance minimum 3x turbine height.

(A 120m [394'] turbine could be as close as 360m [0.22 mile] to a residence). There is no provision for undeveloped land.

4 April Presentations made to County Council. The first explaining the many reasons why setbacks should not be too close to residences and urging County to increase setback distance. The second by AWPC as rebuttal to the first presentation.

7 April AWPC met with 18 concerned seasonal home owners in HRM.

11 April AWPC Open House at St Thomas More church hall. Approx 140 people present, most in opposition.

18 April Public hearing at Cumberland County Municipality. 20 presentations made. Due to large numbers and lack of time, a “no repetition of the facts” rule excluded many more. County has received 70 presentations and letters of concern from residents.

2 May Second Reading at Council scheduled

15 May AWPC Open House at St Thomas More church hall scheduled.

16 May AWPC meeting in HRM. Time and location to be announced.

July Environmental Assessment (EA) expected to be completed

5^th July AWPC Open House at St Thomas More church hall. (This will be the first meeting held during “cottage season” and after when the EA is expected to be completed)

What can you do now?

• To voice your concerns contact CBCL Ltd who is conducting the EA. Ms Annabelle Singleton of CBCL can be contacted at (902) 421 7241 ext.2253 or annabelles@cbcl.ca. The EA has to be conducted and has to include public input.

• Call your councilor

• Write to your local newspaper

• Tell your neighbours

• Get more information at http://pugwashwindfarm.blogspot.com/

Happy Earth Day

We must strive to help our environment as much as possible.

Global warming is a fact.

We need to reduce, reuse and recycle. We also need to conserve resources. Check out this link and test your awareness http://www.earthday.ca/pub/resources/psas/print/EcoTriviaPSA.pdf

We need to challenge ourselves to improve on our "carbon footprint". Can you reduce the use of your washer, dryer, plastic grocery bags etc? Could you walk or use public transport instead of using your vehicle?

We need to encourage the development of renewable energy production. This is a huge country with all kinds of potential for developing wind, solar and tidal energy production. These industries can easily coexist with people if developed in the appropriate locations.

If industrial installations are permitted to displace existing economies, public support will stop.

Putting a wind farm in cottage country, for example, would displace a growing and incredibly important recreation/cottager/tourist industry which keeps our local stores and services going.

Public hearing at County

For those of you who have never been to a Cumberland County Council meeting, I will set the scene for you.

The Council Chambers are not very big. The Councillors and staff take up about half of the room and rest is two banks of seating, each being four rows that each seat around six people. Yesterday there was an extra row of chairs at the back, more chairs just outside the double doors at the back and a few down the aisle inside.

The press likes to sit front and to the right. Yesterday there was The Herald, Amherst Daily News and Oxford Journal. I didn't recognise any others, although there was someone with sound recording equipment. Other Council staff may be there and tend to take the front left seats.

Wednesday, the seats (Gallery) were full to overflowing, mostly of Gulf Shore people. People had travelled from Toronto, Fredericton, HRM and points beyond. AWPC took up most of the back row on the right. There were also competing wind energy companies and consultants.

The Councillors sit in two rows facing each other. There is an elevated front bench (courtroom style) where Warden Hunter, Rennie Bugley and (yesterday) Jim Coughlin, County Planner sits and the recording secretary sits at a desk below that. Near the gallery is another table with three chairs and three microphones from which the public make their presentations. This leaves an open area in the middle.

The meeting opens with "Oh Canada" and closes with "God Save the Queen".

Wednesday's meeting ran from 1-5pm. All other regular business was held off so that there was as much time as possible to hear presentations.

The rules:

No repetition of facts already submitted.

15 minutes maximum.

Councillors are not permitted to leave the room while presentations are being made.

Presenters are not allowed to ask questions but Councillors may ask the presenter questions.

There was a laptop set up if anyone had a PowerPoint presentation. Only one person used it.

There was no particular order of speakers.

The no repetition rule whittled down the number of presenters to just 20. There were people who had travelled from HRM who didn't get a chance to speak, which seemed like a shame. I had, untypical but luckily, not sent in my presentation ahead of time. Anyone who had sent their presentation in ahead was not allowed to speak. The very first (potential) speaker found this out very quickly. Warden Hunter runs a pretty tight ship when it comes to the rules.

Early on were presentations from the Province. I didn't catch their last names.

Jason from Dept of Energy told us that the Province is committed to be producing 20% of its energy from renewable resources by 2013.

Vanessa from Dept of Environment and Labour told us about the Environmental Assessment (EA) that has to be completed. She spoke very knowledgeably but too fast for my note taking skills, so what follows is only part of what she said. Wind power is a new industry and they are still working on how they are assessed. A wind farm is a Class 1 project and after the application for one is submitted there is a period of 25 days before a decision is made. The public has 10-14 days to look at the information and comment upon them. Those comments are posted on their website and are thus openly available to anyone to view. There are five decision options that can be taken by the minister. After a project is completed enforcement of infractions is handled through regional offices.

I strongly suggest you look through at least the citizen's guide to EAs

http://www.gov.ns.ca/enla/ea/docs/EAProponentsGuide.pdf

http://www.gov.ns.ca/enla/ea/docs/EACitizenGuide.pdf

The presentations included information about increasing complaints about noise in other locations, comparative turbine size (eg twice the height of the tallest part of Confederation Bridge), shadow flicker (three blades x 15 rotations per minute = 75 flickers per minute), wind farms in Alberta being more remote from residences, bird mortality concerns, a 40 turbine wind farm in Hawaii that over 10 years has fallen into disuse but with no one left to take down these eyesores, decibel levels used should be not just time weighted but weighted against background noise. There was information on property devaluation and a great deal of comment as to how much the Gulf Shore is cottage country and how important that is to the local economy. There was a concern about making bad neighbours over this particular project.

A couple of people who live near existing turbines spoke. There was a man who lives near one of the two turbines near Rodney (Windham Hill) and another who lives near the RCMP turbine and both said that you could sometimes hear it but it didn't bother them. The man from Rodney said there was flicker "for a few seconds".

Discussed was how different people have different perceptions of the same thing (noise, viewplane). Also discussed was the concern that there is stress from worry about noise, health issues, loss of property value and worry about making bad neighbours. While it seems sure that wind energy is going to become more prevalent, why should our community be the socio economic experiment when there are so many other, better places for it?

Many said that the setback issue was too complex for one size fits all land use bylaw and suggestions to deal with this varied from designating different setback to different land use zones, different setbacks from residences than from property lines, a win/win solution needs to be found . Another suggestion was for setbacks to be at a maximum and leave it to the proponent to prove that they could encroach on that setback without causing harm. We were warned that there is currently still a low knowledge level in the province and the country, so that we should therefore be very conservative in our setbacks.

There was information about the low population density of this county that leaves plenty of room for turbines. We were told we have a resource (wind) and when you have a resource, the people who want to use it will come, even if setbacks are conservative. If turbines need to go somewhere remote but with no transmission lines, then the transmission line will simply have to be put in - NS Power can't expect wind energy companies to just use current power lines.

In the four hours of presentations there was much more said, often with passion and deep concern.

Charles Demond (AWPC) responded to some of what had been said. He agreed that perceptions of problems can be affecting but suggested that because they were just perceptions, that they didn't then actually have any value. He addressed the EA process. They plan to have two more meetings. He agreed that turbines can be seen and can be heard, its a matter of what you can get used to. He said that with the oncoming wind energy industry generally, our future sound and viewplane levels were going to change. His company has already paid the deposit to NS Power for their Request for Interconnection which is due tomorrow.

It was decided that it was too late in the day to go through second reading. Not only that, they had still to review applications 47 through 61 that had been sent in earlier. A motion to table the second reading to May 16th so that Councillors could travel to Pubnico to visit the wind farm there was defeated. There was no discussion allowed that day because the motion was tabled (to May 2nd).

This part of the process is over, for now. Do not send any more materials to Jim Coughlin. However, that doesn't mean you can't contact your Councillor directly.

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I have spoken with quite a few people in the wind energy industry and they are very concerned about the Gulf Shore project. They are concerned that the bad press over this project will endanger their own projects. They agree with me that this project could actually be environmentally unfriendly because of lack of public approval that could later affect other, more appropriately located, projects.

Wind farm map

This map is a vast improvement on the one I published last year.

That map was so hard to read, I misread it and thought the wind farm only stretched east to Dan R Lane. It goes much further east to Ocean View Drive (almost to the old Macfarlane Road). Both maps are identical in where the turbines are located.

In the spirit of disclosure, AWPC sent this (in acrobat). I cannot post a .pdf here, so I have captured most of the image and converted to a .jpeg.

The turbines are around 400m apart. This is the closest they can go to each other, as recommended by Vestas. Therefore, the only way that this farm could be setback further from residences would be to eliminate some turbines.

Comments

Comments section is reactivated.

AWPC open house

When I arrived at St Thomas More church hall last Wednesday evening, there was already over 140 people seated and AWPC was just getting started on a presentation.

Over the next hour more people arrived. Daniel and Carolyn d'Entremont had driven up all the way from Pubnico.

Atlantic Wind Power Company (AWPC) had three people at a front table and at the back of the hall a rep from Vestas turbines, an environmental analyst, and three or four more from their company.

There was a guest book to sign, glossy brochures, some maps, lapel pins and a table with munchies and tea/coffee/water/pop.

The d'Entremonts had brought and distributed copies of an aerial picture of Pubnico wind farm with their house clearly seen next to some of the turbines.

Charles Demond (AWPC) gave his presentation and then the questions started to come. There were a lot of people who had very valid questions, comments and concerns and they were not always answered directly, if at all.

Questions ranged from where a sub-station would go in (next to existing substation at the Salt Mine), power transmission and distribution cables to how the Environmental Assessment (EA) is progressing.

There were people who spoke about concerns about property value, noise, blight, local economy effects and bird mortality.

There was quite a discussion as to whether this would be in cottage country or not. Apparently, APWC believes that cottage country is just the land to the north of the Gulf Shore Road! There was a lot of time spent on who was to blame (AWPC or the County) for the timing of meetings, consultation with the public and setback bylaw amendments.

There were questions about noise of not just one but 27 turbines. Related to this was discussion as to whether the turbines would be direct or gear drive and whether the rotors would be upwind or down wind.

AWPC had told us about how much tax money would go to the County from their project and they would urge County to spend it here. They have absolutely no say on this matter and the County will spend their money where they like. When asked about how proposed changes to tax laws in Bill 160 would vastly reduce their tax base, we were given a confusing, rambling diatribe on assessments and tax claims (Charles is a lawyer and a chartered accountant).

AWPC generally answered questions by deflecting to something else they could talk about that no one from the floor could answer to. We were told about how the people in Germany and Denmark get along with turbines in close proximity (smaller turbines in smaller numbers and locally owned - not so many big farms as being proposed here). They blinded us with a very poor slide of sound levels at given distances that no one could see to be able to discuss. There was no explanation about decibels and they were using data from Ontario which uses levels higher than those recommended by the World Health Organization.

There were many, many things they said that were incorrect, misleading or spurious - and no way to dispute what they were saying without getting into a shouting match.

Daniel d'Entremont got to express some of his problems he's had with AWPC's wind farm in Pubnico. He says their family was made sick by the turbines, he can't sell his house anyone is welcome to come and stay - its empty because they cannot live there.

AWPC is organising bus tours from Pugwash to Pubnico.

I had deliberately kept quiet for the first part of the meeting. I wanted it to be evident that concerns about this wind farm are not just mine, but of many others. After about an hour an a half I finally got up to have my say and to reply to claims Charles had made earlier against this blog and me.

I introduced myself and explained why this blog exists. Charles had claimed that he had been misrepresented here. He took particular offence at the minutes of last Saturday's meeting being posted.

I reminded Charles that what he had said had outside Council Chambers last week had been witnessed by people who were all also at this meeting and I had reported him accurately (he claims that what he meant was that the wind farm wasn't going into cottage country, because it was going in south of the Gulf Shore Road).

I accepted that maybe it hadn't been wise to so quickly publish minutes of a meeting I hadn't been to and (he claims) he had not yet seen himself. In order not to get distracted by such a minimal point (in comparison to way more important concerns) I told him I would change the previous blog entry, which I did as soon as I got home.

I asked about the EA process and asked if AWPC had seen a new report which clearly concludes that, because of concerns over health, loss of property value etc, setbacks should be a minimum of 2km. They hadn't seen it and I promised to send it to them, which I have. The report I was referring to is the first of two found on the following link, but the second is excellent also. http://www.windturbinenoisehealthhumanrights.com/

One of the other presenters (I am sorry I never caught his name) had said earlier that when he looks
for the location for a new wind farm the most important criteria is wind speed. I challenged this. All the critics and indeed most wind turbine manufacturers, consultants and proponents agree, that a far more important issue is current land use.

He had also said that there was no wind away from the shoreline.

I didn't get to reply to that at the open house but anyone who can access a wind map can see this is absolutely not true. ScotianWindfields showed us some really neat software that has very detailed wind maps. The Cobequids rate very highly for wind.

I was explaining why it was so important why County writes a good turbine setback bylaw, which in turn could easily be adopted by other counties or even (eventually) the Province when suddenly, Charles changed his tone with me. I could feel I was being sucked into a trap, but I couldn't work out fast enough what it was. He asked me what I was asking for a setback. I said 2km. I know this is too simplistic a setback, property borders and land use have to be considered etc etc and I had tried to say that there are some provisos that should be included. But I quickly felt out of my depth (planning strategies isn't my strong suit) so rather than be standing there stammering and stumbling I simply answered that the setback should be 2km from every residence, whether it is a million dollar home or a one room shack - everyone deserves their peace and quiet and health. He triumphantly replied "So do I".

Later on, it became clear as to what the trap had been. They then repeatedly used the claim that 2km setback from any residence would kick out any wind farm anywhere in the County. Of course, no one had County maps with them with every house marked on it to dispute this. They claimed that there would be no wind power generation in the County!

Excellently laid trap, making utterly spurious claims which distracted the crowd from the point in hand - whether a wind farm should go in cottage country on the Gulf Shore.

No one has said there should be no wind power generation - either in farms or in smaller installations. I can confidently say that everyone at the meeting is pro wind.

Our concerns are with the location of this particular farm.

There were some more excellent questions and comments from the floor, but the meeting had now been going on for over three hours and people were starting to leave. The meeting slowly broke up.

Very late in the meeting there were a couple of men who spoke up for the turbines. I understand that the gentlemen who spoke passionately about how we must embrace wind energy because of global warming and for the sake of future generations is the same person who recently bought huge tracts of land and clear cut them to farm blueberries.

As I have mentioned before, large open uninhabited areas (such as blueberry fields) would be perfect for wind energy generation.

I spoke with Annabelle Singleton of CBCL Ltd. This is the consulting firm that is handling the Environment Assessment (EA). They also handled the EA for the Pubnico project. Ms Singleton was very attentive, answered questions immediately and clearly and was taking copious notes. I have great hopes that she will put together a comprehensive and complete EA.

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If you haven't e-mailed, phoned or written to your councillor, please do so right away. The next Council meeting is this Wednesday when there will be a public hearing. Anyone who turns up to speak must be heard. They then have the opportunity to go to second reading that day or may postpone to a later date.

The current County proposal is for 3x the height of the turbine.

I am suggesting 10x the height or 2km, whichever is greater. Other suggestions have been for anything from 1km to 5km.

Minutes of meeting in HRM with AWPC

Minutes are available via e-mail