Hoosac Wind Appeal stalls wind project
FLORIDA — A group of residents and state environmentalists will appeal the court decision that cleared the way for a 30-megawatt wind turbine project on Bakke Mountain in Florida and Crum Hill in Monroe. The appeal will likely delay the $45 million project by a year at least.
The group maintains the Department of Environmental Protection’s acting commissioner, in approving a wetlands permit for the project, did not follow the agency’s regulations.
Superior Court Justice Frank M. Gaziano ruled earlier this year that DEP acting Commissioner Arlene O’Donnell’s decision was acceptable. Attorney John C. Bartenstein, who represents the two groups, said the appeal will ask the Massachusetts Appeals Court to reconsider Gaziano’s ruling.
Based on Gaziano’s Jan. 21 ruling, some Florida residents hailed the project as finally being able to move forward.
Town Administrator Christine Dobbert said the town had been anticipating a windfall payment in lieu of taxes from the project’s developer. Now with the appeal, that’s been delayed: A state Appeals Court official said the case will likely take 12 to 18 months until resolution.
“I just think it’s a shame,” Dobbert said. “I really thought that with the president and everybody pushing for green communities and green power that they would not appeal this. But it isn’t the end of the world. We’ll move on.”
Jan Johnson, a spokeswoman for Iberdrola Renewables, the company that owns New England Wind LLC, which, in turn, owns the Hoosac Wind Project, expressed disbelief that an appeal would have been filed in the face of economic hardships and a nationwide call for more clean energy.
“Despite positive assessments from state permitting authorities and repeated support from the communities, the proposed project is facing another delay at a time when the economic and environmental advantages of clean, home-grown, renewable power have never been more important for the commonwealth of Massachusetts,” she said.
Johnson added that the delay will not dampen the company’s enthusiasm for the project.
“We believe the Hoosac site remains an excellent site for development, and we look forward to the outcome of the appeal,” she said. “We’re disappointed, but not surprised. We are confident that the state’s decision to grant the permit is correct and that the courts will once again uphold the permit.”
The 20, 1.5-megawatt wind turbines would have a capacity of 30 megawatts, enough to power 9,000 homes. The project, which started in 2004, had its original permit withdrawn in February 2005, when local residents and environmentalists appealed the DEP’s wetlands permit.
Since then, the project has been tied up in the courts. The back and forth has centered on the wetlands permitting issue and the impact of construction on stream beds.
A spokeswoman for the Massachusetts Attorney General’s office, who is representing the defendant — the Department of Environmental Protection — in the case, declined to comment.
By Scott Stafford
1 April 2009
Tags: Wind power, Wind energy
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