National Wind Watch: Wind Energy News » Petition calls for end to turbine projects

A petition is circulating the community calling for a stop to all further wind turbine development within the Municipality of Kincardine.

Organizer and local resident Rachel Thompson said many local businesses within the municipality are standing up to host the petition.

“There are many businesses in the area who are hosting our petition, not all of them wanted their names in the paper but these seven below do want to be included in the article,” Thompson said via e-mail. “We are very grateful to them for providing this service.”

Lake Huron Rod & Gun, Bumper’s Pizza and Daisy Mart in Tiverton, Sugar Shack Tattoo, Fine Fettle and Eight Sisters in Kincardine, as well as Cottage Grocery in Inverhuron have all stepped forward as locations for residents to sign the petition.

Thompson said many of these business owners don’t want to be considered “anti-wind power” but are instead standing up because they see it as a much more “complex issue”.

“As I went up and down some concessions in the last couple of weeks, my suspicion was confirmed that the vast majority of rural Kincardinites are opposed to industrial wind turbines,” said petitioner Allard Eisen in the e-mail. “I collected 210 signatures from Con. 5, Northline, Hwy. 9 and Southline, and it could have easy been more if all members over voting age from those households would have been present. Just only a handful of people who did not sign because they did not want to see their name on a piece of paper because of their business, and a few who did not care one way or another.”

The petition targets the “negative effects” of wind turbine projects proposed within the municipality, along with the proximity of homes to turbines within the Enbridge Ontario Wind Turbine project. The petition also mentioned the buyout of five property owners by Acciona within the Ripley Wind Power Project due to “perceived health impacts”.

The petition then implores municipal council to use “whatever means necessary” under, but not limited to the Municipal Act “to defend the health, safety and well-being of our community as guaranteed by the Bill of Rights and the Canadian Constitution, by stopping any further construction of IWT (Industrial Wind Turbine) Projects in Kincardine until the problems caused by the Enbridge Projects are completely resolved.”