August 14, 2018
Illinois, Letters

Are wind turbines safe, quiet?

Daily Chronicle | www.daily-chronicle.com | Wind turbines safe, quiet? False | www.daily-chronicle.com

While Chicago resident Cary Shepard states that it’s time for us in DeKalb County to embrace wind energy, the disadvantages will only be experienced by those of us living here. The statement that claims the debate is settled on safety and noise issues is patently false. One need only to have attended a single meeting of the DeKalb County Planning and Zoning Commission to know that noise from turbines cannot be mitigated to a level that is acceptable to surrounding landowners who are not being paid to accept the negative effects of a wind farm in their backyard.

Is it reasonable for a homeowner living near a wind farm to accept significant property value loss on the largest investment they have made?

There are numerous studies that prove values of homes and land around wind farms can decrease by as much as
40 percent.

How about not being able to open your windows anymore because the variety of noises that turbines make never stops? Or, in my case, accepting that thousands of birds and bats will be killed each year by these very turbines when there is better technology to prevent all those deaths? A nickname was given to the wind turbines by a Sierra Club employee back in 2012 during a hearing on a California wind turbine – “Cuisinarts of the sky!”

And that employee was speaking in favor of the wind project.

Those of us who have been studying this subject for as long as 10 years when the first wind farm was built in southern DeKalb County know that it’s just not economically feasible for wind farms to exist without subsidies. Or without noise, flicker, property value loss and extreme loss of wildlife. So find a better way.

Many thanks to the Planning and Zoning Commission for their thoughtful and serious contemplation of this issue. And to all the DeKalb County residents who show up at meeting after meeting in a ratio of about 100:1 in opposition to the proposed wind farm project.

Kathy Stelford

Sycamore

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2018/08/14/are-wind-turbines-safe-quiet/