March 1, 2012
Massachusetts

Energy subcommittee reports Madaket wind turbine would be profitable

By Jason Graziadei, I&M Senior Writer, The Inquirer and Mirror, www.ack.net 1 March 2012

The fierce debate over the proposed wind turbine in Madaket has escalated as the days tick down to Town Meeting next month, and has played out in several arenas – at public meetings, in online venues like Facebook, and in the pages of this newspaper, with dozens of stories and letters to the editor.

The town’s consultants and project proponents continue to make their case for the installation of a 900 kilowatt wind turbine at the landfill, while a group of Madaket homeowners has fought tooth and nail against the proposal, paying for studies that they claim show the project would violate noise restrictions and would hurt property values.

Meanwhile, an unheralded and unpaid group of citizens has spent hours huddled around a table at the old Nantucket Electric Company building off Old South Road for the past two months, diligently tackling one of the most vexing questions about the project – does it make financial sense?

Formally known as the Energy Study Committee’s “subcommittee on wind turbine risk assessment,” the group completed its work this week and offered the Board of Selectmen and the Finance Committee a 35-page report documenting its findings.

“The Subcommittee has reached unanimous agreement that a Madaket Wind Turbine with a certified power production curve and verifiable field operating experience in a similar environment will produce significant positive cash flows throughout its projected 20-year project life,” the group concluded. “That certified power production curve and a verifiable record of field operating experience, which would be ascertained through the RFP process, are mandatory prerequisites for the project to go forward with Board of Selectmen approval.”

Read the full report here

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URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2012/03/01/energy-subcommittee-reports-madaket-wind-turbine-would-be-profitable/