Anti turbines
The Canberra Times | March 26, 2013 | www.canberratimes.com.au
Angus Taylor, candidate for Hume, makes good points regarding proliferation of wind turbines in this region (”Farmers fear ill wind in expansion of turbine plan”, March 25, p5). Would other industrial activity on the scale of the 1400 turbines for Hume alone, be routinely approved? What about several hundred well-run quarries or mines?
Considered in terms of sound public policy, where’s the proof that building hundreds of wind turbines is among the set of lowest-cost options for climate change mitigation: options ranked by cost per tonne of carbon emissions avoided. Despite electricity prices soaring, Taylor estimates those in Hume alone will still require subsidy of $500million every year.
Note that surveys of people living within 10 kilometres of turbines – surveys that exclude electricity consumers in cities such as Canberra and Goulburn, for whom the turbines will be out of sight, out of mind – show 70 per cent opposed.
Cuthbert Douglas, Bonython
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2013/03/26/anti-turbines/