April 15, 2008
Letters, Wisconsin

Wind turbines are a 24-hour pain

Another piece pumping up those obscene wind turbines, this time with some twisted correlation with $4 a gallon gas (Guest Editorial, The Reporter, April 2).

Plugging your electric car into a windmill every 40 miles might work. Give some credit to Calumet County for deciding not to go with 400-foot turbines. Perhaps they have seen how the landscape has been permanently trashed at Johnsburg. Now if the politicians in Chilton could start working with the solar energy people they could set a good example for the rest of this area. They will have to initiate some kind of energy program before our governor and his wind crowd take revenge.

Here, near the Brownsville project, we have not heard a good word about the turbines that are operating. The complaints vary from resignation to outright fury.

“We didn’t know they would be that big, or this close,” or the surprise at the amount of noise from the blades. Then when the sun goes down, each tower turns on its red flashing beacon. The towers are a 24-hour-a-day pain.

No-trespassing signs are posted at the service roads, effectively ending hunting.

We have been trying to negotiate a relocation of some of the planned turbines near our home. The latest word is that they don’t have a plan ready. It makes one wonder what they are doing with “Plan A.”

Once again, if these promoters would install lower profile turbines, about the height of our old farm windmills, most problems would go away. No blade noise, only a hum from the generator; no red lights at night – even suitable in the back yard. We ourselves have space for some on our own land.

Phil Delfeld

Brownsville