January 21, 2015
Michigan

More sound testing ordered for Lake Winds Energy Park

By STEVE BEGNOCHE, Managing Editor | Ludington Daily News | January 21, 2015 | /www.shorelinemedia.net

The Mason County Planning Commission Tuesday night approved asking its sound consultant to retest five sites at Lake Winds Energy Park to see if turbines near the sites meet existing sound standards.

Operations of four of the test sites had changed as part of a mitigation plan put in place after the initial tests deemed them to violate the sound standard. The retesting is to determine if the mitigation put in place by Lake Winds owner Consumers Energy worked. Good test data has not yet been gathered in the previous two testings at the fifth of the sites being retested, so it is not yet clear if the site falls within the sound standards or violates them.

Commissioners expressed a clear desire that the county demand HGC Engineering of Mississauga, Ontario be in Mason County and ready to test when conditions are right here in late March or April after snow cover is gone and before spring peepers arrive. That window is deemed the best for getting the most accurate results. In the first two years, HGC picked when to come based on weather forecasts – forecasts that sometimes didn’t come true.

“There’s a lot at stake,” Dunlap said, adding results will be closely scrutinized. He said the commission has to get HGC to commit to being here to conduct testing when conditions are right.

For more, see Wednesday’s Ludington Daily News.

[rest of article available at source]

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2015/01/21/more-sound-testing-ordered-for-lake-winds-energy-park/