March 1, 2014
Saskatchewan

Council nixes turbines within city limits

Weyburn This Week | February 28, 2014 | www.weyburnthisweek.com

Weyburn City Council has deemed the trial period of the Brown Crescent wind turbine to be over and decided to disallow wind turbines at residential locations within Weyburn city limits at their regular meeting February 24.

After a call for public input, in the form of mail outs, which resulted in a number of submissions from neighbouring homes, council voted 4-2 in favour of having the turbine removed.

Councillor Nancy Styles made the motion to adopt the option that was passed saying she didn’t feel turbines were a good fit for a residential area.

“I truly appreciate you want to be green, but I truly don’t believe windmills are right for residential areas.”

In voting against the option, Rob Stephanson said he had been through communities that have windmills and he wanted more information before making a decision and not making a decision just because “it doesn’t look nice.”

The wind turbine was installed by Dustin and Vanessa Storle in 2010 on a 12-month trial basis, after which the project would be reassessed. The reassessment had never officially been completed, although an inspection was carried out in 2012.

In a letter to city council, Dustin states, “I did not intend to harm or reduce any ones quality of life when we erected our turbine in 2010. We simply wanted to diversify our energy sources to reduce our homes use of fossil fuel and its carbon footprint.”

A neighbour of the Storles’, Jessie Gervais had submitted a video of the turbine casting shadows throughout her house stating the strobe-like effect were triggers for migraines, of which she suffers.

Other complaints received from neighbouring properties about the operation of the wind turbine cited visual nuisance, questionable safety and negative impacts on resale value.

Council have given Dustin and Vanessa Storle until July 30 to remove the wind turbine. The couple will be moving their turbine to the town of Lake Alma.

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2014/03/01/council-nixes-turbines-within-city-limits/