There is no doubt that the wind farm industry has a zealous pecuniary interest in covering as much of Australia and the world with their huge wind turbines as possible.
They are not altruistic enough to warn prospective hosts and neighbours of the known downsides, but worldwide, have included secrecy clauses in their hosts’ contracts.
They deny wind farms are noisy. Sales are priority. Those registering their legitimate complaints concerning noise (www.nationalwindwatch.org), do not consider their experiences “myths”.
They are not “nimby”s, as many had welcomed the advent of wind farms.
They had been lied to about the noise. Now their plight is being ignored.
Wind farms are not inevitable, their net benefit gain is highly debatable.
If they are to be installed, responsible, considerate siting should be mandatory.
That is not within 5km of dwellings, or within regions of sensitive ecological significance.
The 62 turbine Woolnorth wind farm in Tasmania, has recently been reported as a “black hole” for their endangered Tas Wedge Tail Eagle.
Fair compensation should be given to adversly affected people living too close to turbines.
Sth Gippsland Shire (W/T 12/12) recognised the hazards by requiring all vendors of land in the region warn prospective buyers of the adverse effects of the Bald Hills Wind Farm. Accepting that wind farms devalued property, the ruling was designed to avoid legal battles.
Also, any turbines killing protected birds would be shut down.
Since vast amounts of land may be given over to 100-200mt high turbines plus their accompanying high voltage transmission lines, how appropriate are our fire fighting strategies around dense wind farm regions? Will both ground and air support be restricted to the perimeters of wind farms for combating fires? If there have been no air trauma incidents to date, is it that such wind farm sites are considered too risky for air support?
These are early days, and we need answers and thorough objective research, acknowledging all the downsides, not platitudes or selective, deceptively optimistic “facts”. Will such a cure create more problems than it solves?
Especially when there are much less invasive, more effective alternative solutions needing our attention and dollars.
Beware the spin doctors for snake oil cures to climate change.
Michaela Samman
Tantawangalo.
5 February 2008
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2008/02/05/wind-farms/