February 21, 2008
Ontario
Ontario
The conclusion of the Ontario Municipal Board hearing into the Amaranth portion of the 132- megawatt Melancthon II wind farm is being scheduled for the township offices at Laurel on Feb. 27 and 28.
In the meantime, the various protocols requested by hearing officer Norm Jackson at the adjournment of the hearing last October were to be reviewed by township council last night. The protocols form part of the minutes of settlement between the township and the proponent, Canadian Hydro Developers Inc.
The major focus of the protocols is noise monitoring at the transformer substation. Monitoring has been continuing, but the results have not been made public.
At the earlier hearing, Mr. Jackson indicated his dissatisfaction with an earlier Certificate of Approval for the first of two 230 kV transformers at a time when neighbour Paul Thompson and others said they were still unhappy with the noise abatement.
At the hearing, Mr. Thompson played a digital recording of noise levels at his home. These, however, had been recorded prior to the erection of noise barriers and berms at the substation.
Mr. Jackson was at least as impressed by Cheryl Whitworth’s claims to noise effects on her health and sleep patterns as he was by the recordings.
He said he empathized with Mrs. Whitworth, whose health claims had arisen after Joan Lever (another party to the hearings) had e-mailed her a report of someone else experiencing similar problems.
Since the hearing last fall, there have been indications that additional noise barriers will be built at the substation, and the existing transformer is likely to be replaced with a different model.
By Wes Keller
Freelance Reporter
21 February 2008
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2008/02/21/amaranth-turbine-hearing-rescheduled/