May 14, 2012
Pennsylvania

Mixed emotions after wind turbine company axes project

By: Angie Koehle, wearecentralpa.com 14 May 2012

BEDFORD COUNTY – It was a battle that used to draw a crowd at the Bedford Township Supervisors’ meetings.

“People that were going to get a pile of money over it, they want them here,” township resident and farmer, Ron Dibert said. “The people that have nothing to gain except the annoyance of looking at them, they are the once that are complaining. I’m like Sweden, I stay in the middle.”

Dibert didn’t stand to gain much from the addition of about 24 of the massive wind turbines. Dibert said he may have made a few thousand dollars from an access road on his property or been able to lease a small portion of land he has on Dunning Mountain.

“(If) they wanted to give us a couple thousand dollars a year, that would be helpful because our taxes are $7,300 a year,” he said.

Though Dibert doesn’t care much one way or the other that the company planning the multi-million dollar project pulled the plug, many of his neighbors are disappointed. Other farmers said they would have made thousands. But opponents said there are many in the area that don’t believe it was worth it.

“They didn’t support the wind projects , they supported the mountain staying the way it was. They are also thrilled with the idea there is just not going to be industrial development on the mountain,” Laura Jackson of the group, Save Our Allegheny Ridges, said.

Iberdrola Renewables Incorporated cite economic reasons for shelving the project. A spokesperson with the company said, right now, they have no plans to revisit the possibility of building the wind farm.

“At this point we’ve communicated to the participating land owners that executed leases with us, as well as the community where we were doing work that we are ceasing development efforts on the project,” Iberdrola spokesperson Paul Copleman said.

Another project planned by the same company in Clearfield County was also scrapped. It’s the Clover Run Project and would have been located between Grampian and Luthersburg.

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2012/05/14/mixed-emotions-after-wind-turbine-company-axes-project/