Wind Farms?

[mr T]

Theres a proposed 48 unit wind tower project 2miles from my home  It will take up 10 miles of mt top there 400 ft high with 240 ft blades I was in faver of it until i learned  there getting 1/3 of cost pd by gov subsidy Any body else having this happen in their area?

[ely]

most likely its happening everywhere. i know they have filled up western oklahoma with the wind turbines. they have articles in the coop papers that tell how wonderful and how "green " the power is. some people in the state even pay a little extra for the green power. i guess it helps them sleep better at night knowing they have done their part in reducing the carbon footprint. what they do not understand is once the power is dumped into the grid its all the same power, be it nuecs, hydro, gas or coal.

[Tom Sawyer]

Just got a letter in the mail today inviting me to a public meeting with a company that is planning to put a bunch around here.  We already have a bunch along the shore of Lake Huron within less than an hour's drive in either direction.  I don't know who is paying for them though.

Tom

[red oaks lumber]

the more power is made from wind the less needs to come from other means.  the cost for wind power should be fairly consistant from year to year. when the gov't passes cap and trade everyone will be wishing they got their power from wind or hydro, those sources won't be hit with a carbon credit tax.

[florida]

All the wind farms plus  all the solar arrays in the USA added together don't produce the power of one single 1970's coal fired electrical plant. See if you can find a single windmill in the US that was built without subsidies and you won't be able to. Without the Federal subsidies there would be no wind farms because the subsidies are the only way they make any money. Even during the short periods every day when they do produce power they still have to be backed up by traditional power plants since wind is intermittent. You're very right to be concerned.

[Jasperfield]

I still like my electricity to come from good ol' COAL. Electricity from high sulphur diesel is pretty good, too.

[forest.c]

they are going to put them up here as well they are an eye sore but at least the tax payers in town will beneft from the money thay have to pay the town also will pay 1000 per year on property tax to land owners in town i just dont know were the money is going to come from.

[red oaks lumber]

when it comes right down to it *DanG near everything has a subsidies. farming, biodiesel,coal, wind, buisness, senior citezens, ect. so it seems we are stuck in the 70's.
so what is wrong with trying to have alternative sources for electricity?

[stonebroke]

A wind energy company wanted to put some on my farm until my NIMBY neighbors decided they did not want to look at them.

Stonebroke

[Bill]

A buddy up along the NY state border has them going in all along the ridge lines ( mtn tops ).

The local farmers/landowners all like the extra money even if the view isn't so good.

They sure did spend a bunch of money to cut in the roads thru the woods along these mtn tops so they could build them .

[Norm]

We have 200 and more on the way by us. A nice clear evening watching the stars now includes 200 red blinking lights.

[mr T]

Hi Norm How about noise level? This is a  big concern here

[Cedarman]

The view of windmills is kind of like raising pigs.  To the producer the aroma smells like money, to the neighbor it smells like ###t.

[Norm]

Florida power and light is the producer.....

Mr T we are not close enough to hear anything, not sure about the neighbors very near them.

[Larry]

I wonder if the real purpose of windmills is to create jobs.  Federal Government built a lot of hydroelectric dams years ago, I think a lot of similarities can be seen.

[Bibbyman]

I came up with what I think is the best use of wind power.

Place them on top of an oil well and have them pump oil.

[Tom]

Jobs idea might be right, but the jobs are being created Off-Shore. 

There was a news article, following the signing of the Jobs Bill, that described all of he jobs that were being created off-shore for what had been intended to be included in the jobs bill before the lines referencing 'buy American' were scratched out.   Now the only jobs are the labor jobs of erecting the "green" products.  These products include things like solar panels and windmills.  The manufacture is being done where there is cheap labor and, I'm sure, the engineering and maintenance will be overseen by those manufacturing countries.

Unfortunately, the report is only documented as a video.

[Larry]

Jobs idea might be right, but the jobs are being created Off-Shore. 

That was correct when they first started putting them up but times are changing.

Arkansas has three maybe four windmill factories and I think there is another one in N Dakota.  They do employ a lot of folks.  I know at least one is foreign owned...maybe they all are.  The state gave big time tax incentives to lure em here.  Not for sure if it was worth it or not...but our state is in a good financial position.

[stonebroke]

GE 's renewable energy world headquarters is in Schenectady NY. They don't build or assemble them but they do all the designing, engineering and planning.

Stonebroke

[woodsteach]

They have started putting up 40 on the Ks /neb line and we get the last 2 on the line.  The $ is welcome but the bs isn't. 

Our power co still has to produce the same power every day whether the windturbines move or not!  So Green my butt :-[ :-[  just stop and think of all of the fuel used to level, pour, ship, install etc each of those things.  and Footprint.... those things stretch for MILES not just a square mile like for a plant.  We would not have gotten the 2 but since we were going to have to look at the other 38 we might as well take the good ($)

woodsteach

[stonebroke]

A wind turbine will generate back the energy used in manufacturing, placement  and everything else in about five months.

Stonebroke

[Tom]

I think it is real easy to look at off-shore manufacturing in a short-sighted way.  Not meaning that to be personal, just meaning that there is a depth to manufacture that most of us ignore.

In the case of windmills.  We see the put on our land and we get money for it.   We see that as getting an American Dollar.  We see trucks hauling the equipment, truckers driving the trucks, riggers setting up the equipments, maintenance men taking care of the mill, yard people mowing the grass or dressing the road and say, "look at all the jobs it created."

What we don't look at is the economy of doing all of that being handled through a foreign country.  It's those moguls who benefit from the American Tax incentives, jobs of the economists who control the company, the off-shore companies who make the generators and other equipment that are the heart of the system and the ultimate loss of all, the loss of the money.

You see, those dollars that another country "earns" in the United States, whether it be an illegal alien picking tomatoes, or a windmill company that is taking the profits from their farm, are taken directly out of circulation in the USA.  Those profits go to pay employees in the other countries.  They are spent on the building of more plants in other countries.  They are going toward creating more jobs in those other countries and, the money doesn't get back into circulation here, so it is lost.  Not only arel the profits lost, but the tax money ( it came from your pocket, remember) that is lost to the creation of the industry, finds its way to the moguls of the other country, not to the job creation or industry building in the USA. 

You have to look over the fence to see it, but the money is on a one way trip out of the country.  Now picture that as something tangible.  It's easy to think of Government money as free money.  But when you think of it as Gold, and you see the trail of our gold crossing the boarder, it begins to have a different meaning.  Sure, there are arguments that some of it comes back, but I'm not much of a proponent of them.

This loss of money is true with all of the industry we lose.  Money that could have stayed at home, been passed in a tight little circle amongst the citizens of a town and given them the means to increase their buying power.  But when the dollars leave the borders, whether for services or product, they are lost.

This is almost over-simplistic but let's say that Tomville, a little town of 10,000 people has a gross liquid dollar value of a million dollars.  A hamburger joint in the big city sets up shop and hires folks to work there.  The bread, meat, potatoes and drinks are bought elsewhere and shipped in.  They are paid for by the sale of the hamburgers.  Each resident eats two hamburgers a day and spends a dollar.  Twenty-five cents of that dollar goes to the employees.  That pays for the creation of the jobs.

The rest goes to the big city where it pays for the next shipment of bread, meat, potatoes and drinks.  The cattle farmers in Tomville might benefit if they sell their cattle to the hamburger company, but the rest goes into the coffers of the moguls in the paper shuffling jobs.   That money goes to pay for their cars, their houses, their medical, their vacations (maybe one would take a vacation in Tomville), their furniture, their education, etc.  Tomville never sees that money again.  For kicks let's say it is 50 cents a person per day.

So, unless Tomville residents can get that money back someway.....   How long will it take for all of the money to drain from the "hole in the bucket" in Tomville?

Yeah, it's simplistic and not totally accurate, but, do you get my drift?

That's what makes the die-hards buy from the mom and pop local stores instead of the Wal-marts and K-marts.  That's also what makes one leery of the government spending tax dollars to create "holes in the bucket". 

[mr T]

Right on Tom I agree All of these will be built on paper co land so no money to private landowners  The life of these units are only 25 yrs  Short term gains long term impact.

[Brad_S.]

Mr. T,
What wind company is developing the project you are refering too?

[mr T]

Its called Independence Wind LLC Its supposed to be a Maine co. but who knows?Central me power sold out to some spanish co Fla lite &power owns allthe hyro units now.I think everything here is owned by outside interests.