From Industrial Wind Action Group
Highland County Supervisors liable for non-compliance with Endangered Species Act - letter
December 28, 2009 by James T. Rodier
Summary:
Wood Rogers PLC, the Roanoke law firm representing Highland Citizens, has advised the Highland County Board of Supervisors that allowing Highland New Wind Development to proceed without the Incidental Take Permit (ITP) required by the Endangered Species Act will place the county in legal jeopardy. The letter by Attorney James T. Rodier which details the supporting law can be accessed by clicking on the link(s) at the bottom of this page.
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Wood Rogers PLC, the Roanoke law firm representing Highland Citizens, has advised the Highland County Board of Supervisors that allowing Highland New Wind Development to proceed without the Incidental Take Permit (ITP) required by the Endangered Species Act will place the county in legal jeopardy. The Highland supervisors have ignored previous warnings on the advice of the county's attorney.
The new warning follows the recent federal court ruling requiring Chicago-based Invenergy Inc., to stop further construction of its Beech Ridge Project in nearby Greenbrier County, WV and to dramatically curtail operation of 40 completed turbines until the required ITP permit is obtained.
As outlined in the Woods Rogers letter, the issues related to Highland New Wind Development, which has started site preparation without an ITP, are even-more compelling.
Whereas the Beech Ridge project threatens one endangered bat species, the Highland project threatens two endangered bat species and both bald and golden eagles. Moreover, unlike the the Beech Ridge case where only the developer was responsible for compliance, in the Highland case, both the developer and the authorizing local officials are responsible for compliance.
Both the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries (VDGIF) have advised Highland New Wind to obtain an ITP before proceeding. Based on the importance of the site as a migratory pathway for birds and bats, the VDGIF contended in testimony presented to the State Corporation Commission that the project may result in the highest mortality rates for any wind energy project in the eastern U.S.
Web link: http://www.vawind.org/
Friday, January 1, 2010
Recreational Areas Matter
Story posted Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Resident Fights Plan To Plop Wind Turbines On Lake Michigan
By TODD WESSELL Journal & Topics Editor
For the last 35 years, longtime Des Plaines resident Emil Schwarz has regularly driven south around Lake Michigan and straight north on Highway 31 to his small home in Pentwater, Michigan.
Pentwater, with its population of approximately 1,000, is a scenic, quiet village known for its summer music concerts at the village green and its close proximity to Lake Michigan.
If a newly-formed company has its way, however, Schwarz and many other local residents believe Pentwater and the 100-mile long coastal stretch from Muskegon on the south to Ludington on the north will dramatically alter the area for the worse.
Scandia Wind Offshores (SWO) is hoping to apply for state lease permits sometime in the first quarter of 2010 to develop a huge wind farm along the western shoreline of Lake Michigan. If all the necessary permits are granted following a process that could take years, the coastal landscape in that region will be filled with as many as 200 rotating, white wind turbines. Plans call for the windmills to jut out of the water at a maximum location of 3.7 miles from land.
The purpose of the billion-dollar project is to let the west and southwesterly winds generate electricity that eventually could serve large urban centers such as Detroit and Chicago. The spot across Pentwater is considered ideal because of wind speeds that can regularly reach 20 mph, which are normally only attainable in states such as North Dakota and Texas.
A similar kind of wind farm is located along I-65 north of Indianapolis. Unlike the proposed development, the Indiana operation is located on land.
The proposal has created an abundance of controversy pitting those who want to leave the lake undisturbed against others who believe a wind farm is an ideal way to generate cheap, environmentally clean electricity with little disruption.
"I don't like to see anything on the lake," said Schwarz during a telephone interview with the Journal & Topics Newspapers last week. "It's such a great asset."
Schwarz said that while his home is not directly located on Lake Michigan, he believes allowing 200 wind turbines to be erected and easily observed from the shoreline is wrong.
A Des Plaines resident for the last 40 years, Schwarz values the quality time he spends in his quiet west central Michigan home.
"It's like going to the beach and seeing wind turbines out there," Schwarz added. He has weighed in on the issue by voicing his concerns in local newspapers and will continue to do so as the process of allowing or rejecting the proposal runs its course.
Scandia is in the process of trying to gauge local opinion and support before it moves forward.
More public meetings are scheduled in mid-January.
Resident Fights Plan To Plop Wind Turbines On Lake Michigan
By TODD WESSELL Journal & Topics Editor
For the last 35 years, longtime Des Plaines resident Emil Schwarz has regularly driven south around Lake Michigan and straight north on Highway 31 to his small home in Pentwater, Michigan.
Pentwater, with its population of approximately 1,000, is a scenic, quiet village known for its summer music concerts at the village green and its close proximity to Lake Michigan.
If a newly-formed company has its way, however, Schwarz and many other local residents believe Pentwater and the 100-mile long coastal stretch from Muskegon on the south to Ludington on the north will dramatically alter the area for the worse.
Scandia Wind Offshores (SWO) is hoping to apply for state lease permits sometime in the first quarter of 2010 to develop a huge wind farm along the western shoreline of Lake Michigan. If all the necessary permits are granted following a process that could take years, the coastal landscape in that region will be filled with as many as 200 rotating, white wind turbines. Plans call for the windmills to jut out of the water at a maximum location of 3.7 miles from land.
The purpose of the billion-dollar project is to let the west and southwesterly winds generate electricity that eventually could serve large urban centers such as Detroit and Chicago. The spot across Pentwater is considered ideal because of wind speeds that can regularly reach 20 mph, which are normally only attainable in states such as North Dakota and Texas.
A similar kind of wind farm is located along I-65 north of Indianapolis. Unlike the proposed development, the Indiana operation is located on land.
The proposal has created an abundance of controversy pitting those who want to leave the lake undisturbed against others who believe a wind farm is an ideal way to generate cheap, environmentally clean electricity with little disruption.
"I don't like to see anything on the lake," said Schwarz during a telephone interview with the Journal & Topics Newspapers last week. "It's such a great asset."
Schwarz said that while his home is not directly located on Lake Michigan, he believes allowing 200 wind turbines to be erected and easily observed from the shoreline is wrong.
A Des Plaines resident for the last 40 years, Schwarz values the quality time he spends in his quiet west central Michigan home.
"It's like going to the beach and seeing wind turbines out there," Schwarz added. He has weighed in on the issue by voicing his concerns in local newspapers and will continue to do so as the process of allowing or rejecting the proposal runs its course.
Scandia is in the process of trying to gauge local opinion and support before it moves forward.
More public meetings are scheduled in mid-January.
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