April 25, 2023
Arkansas

Previous victory indicates hope for wind turbine opponents

By Becky Gillette - March 29, 2023 - eureka.news

Opponents of the $300-million Nimbus Wind Facility, proposed by Scout Clean Energy, have been told there is no regulatory avenue for stopping the construction of 43 wind turbines at least 500-feet tall near County Road (CR) 905 south of Green Forest. Scout has said it has leases from willing landowners to build the facility that would generate 180-megawatts of energy.

Scout said the company doesn’t need any permits from the Arkansas Public Service Commission for the project because state law provides an exception for independent power producers who will be selling the energy out of state. Normally APSC looks at environmental impacts and determines that there is a need in the state for proposed facilities. Rural Carroll County has no building codes or zoning.

According to Scout, with Nimbus, Carroll County would reap benefits in the form of landowner lease payments of $14 million and property taxes of $25 million over the 30-year life of the facility. Scout said about 300 people would be employed during construction, and 30 employed permanently. Scout said it hasn’t yet signed agreements with the customers who would be receiving the energy, but that there are several interested buyers.

County Judge David Writer, who has been meeting privately with Scout on a road use agreement for CR 905, said there is nothing he can do to prevent the project.

Julie Morton, who lives north of Van Buren, was told there was nothing she and other opponents could do to stop the 200-foot-wide Clean Line Energy high-voltage transmission line that was planned to run 905 miles from western Oklahoma to eastern Arkansas transmitting wind power to eastern states. Arkansas would shoulder the environmental impacts without receiving a single kilowatt of power.

The Clean Line Energy transmission line at first seemed impossible to stop. The federal government had given its approval and state approval wasn’t needed.

“Like Scout, Clean Line Energy tried to keep it quiet so there would be no opposition,” Morton said. “These companies like to slip in so no one is fully aware of what is going on. This is how they do it. Clean Line didn’t have any customers.

“We started trying to stop Clean Line in 2010 and we finally stopped it in 2018. I see a lot of parallels between Clean Line and the Nimbus project. There was no need for that transmission line and there is no need for this. Clean Line never garnered even one customer but was going to wipe out 8,000 acres of habitat. Scientists tell us the single most crucial thing we can do to save the climate is stop deforestation. This was going to wipe out thousands of acres of trees.”

Morton has acquired various types of rights-of-way for 42 years, including working with a large utility that serves Arkansas and Oklahoma. She is not an attorney and cannot give legal advice, but said if what the landowners have signed is a normal easement, permission has been given to use herbicides to control vegetation. The most widely used herbicide in the world, glyphosate, is considered a probable carcinogen, according to the World Health Organization.

“In what way is that environmentally sound and in what way does that help future generations?” Morton asks. “I also wonder about the leases landowners signed. I’m sure the company painted a rosy picture. Are these leases or options to lease? Is there any money up front? Are there any payments if the projects damage water wells, springs, crops or livestock? I’m sure most of these people didn’t want to pay an attorney to look at the lengthy lease agreement. They got this gold dangled in front of them and they just bit the hook.”

A memorandum on a wind energy lease and easement agreement filed with the Carroll County Circuit Clerk states that Scout Clean Energy has the exclusive right for installation of the wind turbines and transmission facilities and “an exclusive agreement for electromagnetic, audio, flicker, visual, electrical or radio interference attributable to the wind turbines.”

Caroline Rogers, who lives on CR 905, said that many people who have leased to wind facilities elsewhere in the country later regretted it after experiencing negative effects such as those listed in the memorandum.

“That is really important about the interferences with electrical devices,” Rogers said. “The wind turbine emissions may interfere with emergency communications and your cell phone. Obviously, the company has run into these same situations before, and is now putting them in the leases so people can’t sue the company. To even bring that up, they have to know that negative effects including health problems associated with what is known as wind turbine syndrome are likely.”

The lease also grants “the right to adjacent and lateral support for the Wind Energy Projects” and “the right to undertake any other activities necessary to accomplish the purposes of the agreement.”

There have been no public meetings or public hearings on a project that would include 43 wind turbines that would rival the height of the Seattle Space Needle at 605 feet. Scout has announced public information sessions on April 11 and 24 from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Berryville Community Center.

Morton said that probably the only people in the county happy with the proposed facility are about 50 landowners who signed leases. She said that represents only .18 percent of Carroll County’s population of 28,435.

“The Department of Energy says that the wind blows more consistently and harder offshore than onshore,’ Morton said. “They don’t need to be in a wind insufficient area like Arkansas. There is no evidence that this is going to be a viable wind area. These are better suited to areas of Oklahoma and Texas where there are no trees. You can put up wind farms to your heart’s content in these areas with the best wind because you are not wiping out any habitat.”

Another thing she finds interesting is that when you click on the financial tab at the Scout Clean Energy website, there is nothing there. She asked, “Do the county officials know who they are getting in bed with? Do the landowners know? Who knows if they will properly maintain the wind turbines? If they are not regulated, who is going to make them?”

It is not just 50 people who will be affected, Morton said.

“People will see these lights for miles and hear a ‘thunk, thunk, thunk’ noise from these turbines,” she said. “There will be people who get zero compensation who will be affected. It just kills me when people are taken advantage of.”

The Clean Line Energy opponents gathered 6,000 signatures across the state opposing the project, they met with their legislators and ultimately got help stopping the project from top legislators including Senators John Boozman and Tom Cotton.

Morton doubts that no permission will be needed from APSC.

“Utilities are highly regulated,” Morton said. “At some point, this project is going to be under the Public Service Commission. The Carroll County judge said there is nothing the county can do. That is not true. They can seek an injunction to stop the project until there is public comment and an environmental impact study. You could ask your state senator to introduce legislation to make this under the purview of the PSC. It needs to be.”

Morton said Scout representatives are developers and salesmen who want to take advantage of government subsidies for green energy.

“But the green they are interested in is greenbacks,” she said.

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2023/04/25/previous-victory-indicates-hope-for-wind-turbine-opponents/