werpknarly, you'd rather have a dozen windmills than a nuclear plant? Try over 200 (that's being optomistic). A typical nuclear plant puts out 1000MW, whereas the last I checked (which admitedely was several years ago) a typical industrial size wind-mill (not the little things you see on farmer's houses or people's back-yards) puts out 5MW with IDEAL conditions. You and your neighbors can build your 200+ windmills (probably more like 1000+), and when the wind dies out and you are desparate for energy (because you can't store it), me and my neighbors will sell you our nuclear generated electricity at premium rates and make out like bandits. You remember the California energy crisis a few years back? As for nuclear waste, you don't have to store it for millions of years, only a couple hundred; the reason it would be radioactive for millions of years is because we're throwing away lots of burnable fuel along with the waste. At least nuclear waste is conveniently concentrated in a solid form which can be easily shielded, stored, monitored, etc, as oppposed to coal which just disperses all the waste in our atmosphere. In fact, I'd encourage you to research just how much coal vs. nuclear waste per MWh is generated. The mass and size of nuclear waste is remarkably small when you consider how much power it generates.

Wind is fine for helping out the load a little bit, but when will people realize that we need major production baseload plants, of which only coal and nuclear are options?

I would like to point out to those who are crying NIMBY that our government is not protecting its citizens from new technology unless they protest. There will be many new developments in the next few years because the price of energy is increasing.
The citizens of Magnolia are protesting this hurried wind project and the Magnolia Town Board is willing to protect them.
This is democracy in action. The Towns need to use the power they have or it will be taken from them.
Please, consider how it would be to live
1000 feet from any industry. The wind turbines are 400 feet and have constant noise when they are running. The 1/2 mile setback is not really far enough to silence the multiple turbines.
What if the research done by Union township study group is right. Wouldn't that be a cruel experiment to do on the children of this area?

we are looking into putting up one right now.. i guess we had better hurry before they are against the law.. then only criminal will have clean air power.. id rather have a dozen of those than a nuclear plant in my back yard (glow in the dark kids would be easier to find at night). you can store the waste in your basement for the next million years!! my fish could use some more mercury from coal plants too

teacher2be I don't think you should teach.YOU seem to be very narrow minded. If you had typed in danger of wind turbines it would have brought up the article that curtain call tried to post. That s all you had to do. I did and it brought it up. There are many, many different articles on line, all you have to do is your research. Sort out the good from the bad. As a teacher2be, you should know that and have the quality and I have to wonder.

Now the committee in Union did just that, they studied many different reports, and study s and based their findings on many things not just ONE>>>

Teacher2be do your research.. Should not have to tell a teacher2be that. But o.k.

littlebadger, I'm glad someone brought up the dependence on natural gas plants. Due to the unreliability of wind, any grid that has wind farms must have some backup reserve of power plants ready to take up the slack if the wind dies; nowadays those reserve plants are typically natural gas. Because the gas plants are running at lower power, they run less efficiently, and therefore in some cases putting up a wind farm will actually INCREASE the emissions per kWh. But FYI, the same problem can exist with solar (cloudy days), not that solar doesn't have enough problems of its own.

Although I will say that I'm not against expanding our current wind resouces. We certainly have some room to expand, but it's just not going to be the major producer so many people seem to think it could be. In another few decades, wind will probably be right where hydro is now: all the useful benefitial locations will already be developed, but it will still only be producing 10-20% of the overall demand.

To those who lament the restriction on building wind farms due to NIMBY, would you also lament restrictions on building a nuclear power plant? Just curious, because if your goal really is relieving our dependence on fossil fuels then nuclear power plants offer far more potential than wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, etc, combined. Yet, in my experience most people who want all these things implemented to replace fossil fuels are unwilling to even cosider nuclear as an option.

You can visit a website that is devoted to this issue and is LOCAL. It's out of Rock County. All of the information for the ordinances of both Magnolia and Union, and all of the supporting documentation can be found at betterplan.squarespace.com. Our family was very disappointed when we began to research this issue. Did you know that industrial scale wind energy is the only alternative energy source that is dependent on fossil fuel powered power plants? They can't run without them. This means that if the grid goes down, the turbines can't function. Because the wind isn't constant, they need coal fired plants to keep things going. Solar doesn't have this problem, nor do manure digesters. Power companies don't like this because it causes them to lose customers. It's the reason (along with huge tax breaks) that power companies are behind wind turbines, even in areas where there is not enough wind to make them efficient, like in southern Wisconsin. We wish they are the Green Santa they claim to be! But it turns out, when improperly sited, they are the Grinch!

"In a place at La Magnolia, which name I do not want to remember, not very long ago lived a noble, one of those nobles who keep a lance in the lance-rack, an ancient shield, a skinny old horse, and a fast greyhound."

Curtaincall: There is no need to get nasty and snippy. I am very interested in the information, but the link you posted did not work at all. Thank you RoadMaster for the correct link. It is comments like those made by curtaincall which make me take his arguments less seriously.

Thank you. I do know it is also available, if I could download and post it I would. But this site only allow so many words!!!!!!!!! Which I am grateful for.

Try this link:

http://www.savewesternny.org/health.html...

IF you are serious about the dangers of these monsters you will drive or walk your self to Evansville. That article gave alot of good info, unless you are not going to the correct site or to blind to read.

curtaincall: The link you posted doesn't show anything--perhaps you could try again?
Also, I think it is a little selfish to say oil spills are ok because they don't happen near you. Guess what? They happen near somebody. Does that mean we shouldn't use oil either? For the good of the country and the planet somebody has to step up to the plate and be the one to take initiative. When it is realized how beneficial wind farms can be, they, too, can be placed on mountaintops and offshore. But I don't think too many companies are going to pony up the dough to do this until it is proven to be beneficial.

http://www.savewesternny.org/images/head...
This is just one link, but it does a very good job explaining the dangers.
There is a lot of unknown about these monsters. Oil Spills usually only happen where there is water, not out in a cornfield/ field down the road from me.

If you contact union I am sure they would share with you the report the committee did. Some one also said it is available at the Evansville library.. IF there was a way I could send it to you I would.

They spent many,many hours researching these monsters. The group was led by a very respectable group of people that went into this wanting to know more them selves than what these company's who want to plant them in our fields are willing to tell you.

This group went into this just wanting to know more. So Union could make a wise choice.

I haven't done extensive research on the subject, but curtaincall, could you please explain what some of the health and safety concerns are? The only thing I read about was something about a few thousand dead birds by a farm in Minnesota. This is sad, but not nearly as devestating as an oil spill. And the birds died from flying into the blades, which I don't believe will be a human problem, and was solved by slowing down the turbines.

I bet not one of you took the time to truly do any research. To hear and see things about these monsters that you don't want to know about. The committee that researched these did a excellent job and there are many health and safety concerns. I think restictions on these are very warrented you would be the same people crying about health symptoms that you have 10 years from now, and probably still in denial that these monsters could have caused your symptoms. villajanesville- sounds like they are in a panic. My neighbor actually was looking at a house in union, and part of me thinks the reason she was is she wanted to get in on this arguement. She is like that.

The Farmers who put these wind turbines on there land will not even get any benefit from them. the electricity generated from them will be sent to other places. The reason ordinance is so that they can not come in an put them anywhere by emminent domain. Now wind power is not something new...........Look across the country side and you see the skeletal remains of wind mills of long ago. There are even some that have been restored and are in use by there owners and the Power companies don't like it.

Those turbines are huge and they need a huge factory to build them in. Just so happens we here in Rock county have.......oh never mind. We are still pinning our hopes on GM.

Well put <VERY!>, lowlyfe!! :)

lowlyfe, I agree with you 100%. And I'm no hippie tree hugger or environmentalist, but I recently began to read about the benefits of wind power, which is virtually perpetual and pollutant free, and I don't understand why anybody would NOT want these in their back yard. I'd take one tomorrow.

There are too many conservative people in this country for us to ever get beyond our dependance on fossil fuels. Granted, the cost of wind farms, hybrid/hydrogen, vehicles is great but as with all new technology the cost of these things will go down over time. Look at the cost of computers 20 years ago compared to what they are now. With more people investing in new technology things can only improve. If nothing ever changed, we would still be living in caves killing our dinner with spears. I personally find the "not in my back yard" mentality pretty irritating.

This is about the worst NIMBY I have ever read. The residents of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket had a HUGE fit about the wind farm being built 9 miles off their coast. Here is a proposed view of what they look like from the shores of Nantucket. Granted its a small picture but if you can see them without straining your eyes, congrats.

http://sustainablog.org/files/2008/01/na...

People complain about the noise like this guy for example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6Q59Fnkr...

Now he's complaining about a 28-33 dbl increase over nomal noise levels which according to this chart:

http://www.epd.gov.hk/epd/noise_educatio...

Is less than the noise that you would hear at the library, without the yelling kids of course. The close mindedness of the american public and the NIMBY attitude is the reason why we will never get away from fossil fuels.