Taxpayers don’t benefit
The Windsor Star, www.windsorstar.com 4 November 2010
Re: Get excited about wind farm benefits, by Ian Kerr, Oct. 25.
Ian Kerr, vice-president, Canadian Development, Brookfield Renewable Power, admonishes a previous writer and tells us that the “residents and ratepayers in Essex County should be excited about the many economic and environmental benefits of new wind farms.”
But in his letter, Mr. Kerr fails to mention even a single one, perhaps because there is none.
Does he really expect that readers will believe that while “the development risks are being borne by the developers, not taxpayers,” it is the latter who will reap the benefits?
Why would a developer bear the risk on a project from which I will benefit? That makes no sense.
If that were the case, the Dalton McGuinty government would not have enacted the anti-democratic provisions of the Green Energy Act, effectively removing all rights from local residents and elected municipal representatives with respect to the location of industrial wind turbines in our backyards.
There may be a few truths in some of what Mr. Kerr writes. Industrial wind turbines may be cost-efficient, but only for the developer.
Our recent hydro bills indicate that we are really paying for them.
Secondly, like mushrooms after a rain, turbines are springing up in a very timely manner. There is less than a year before the next provincial election when we, the taxpayers, can put an end to this nonsense.
Thirdly, although we were promised well-paying green energy jobs, I believe that Mr. Kerr is correct when he writes, “The vast majority of construction workers building wind farms earn but a small fraction of that ($200) hourly wage.”
Mr. Kerr invites us to “be excited” about all this, while worldwide protest movements are mounting against his industry.
But I think that groups such as Wind Concerns Ontario are doing a much better job than the industrial wind turbine industry at helping Essex County residents sort out what is really going on in this county and the rest of Ontario.
Anton Klarich,
Stoney Point
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2010/11/05/taxpayers-dont-benefit/