This page will be updated in early 2012. Please feel free to add comments or links about planned or current renewable energy projects and what this means for you and your community.
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are you tired of the relentless negative spin on wind farms?
The following will be a random collection of positive stories about renewable energy. Please feel free to add your own. It also has links to current ‘live’ debates on news stories relating to wind farms and renewables in general – please visit these stories and add your own comments!
Image from the opening of the Fintry Turbine, north of Glasgow. Click for link.
APPRECIATION OF RENEWABLES:
a profile from Waubra
DOUG Hobson and his brother, Barry, have lived and worked near the Waubra wind farm for the past few years.
They say they have not suffered any adverse health effects.
The siblings have eight turbines on their two properties and say they do not interfere with their prime lamb, stud sheep, canola, wheat, barley, oats, beef, lucerne or pyrethrum production.
“They don’t impact on us at all,” Doug Hobson said.
This story comes from the Weekly Times. [May 2011]
Introducing the WIMBY’s.
Image: Embrace my Planet
Pro-renewables campaigning in the UK.
Wind power surges forward around the globe. Recent commentary from Lester Brown. (March 2011)
Macarthur and Glenthompson projects to deliver 600 jobs (March 2011)
‘Wind turbines are beautiful kinetic sculptures’.
This is a facebook page. “Wind turbines are so cool they should be built for aesthetic reasons, electricity production should be viewed as an optional, non-essential bonus!” There are mostly images from NZ so far.
New UK proposal will mean windfarms to contribute an average of $32,000 a year to communities
A joint initiative by the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and Renewable UK (the renewable energy trade association) will see payments made to local communities where new wind projects are developed.
Most locals in SW Vic praise wind farms in Senate inquiry submissions (Feb 2011). Article from the Portland Observer here.
Windfarms to generate power… and cash for local Councils (Feb 2011)
Councils on the Monaro in the New South Wales south east are to receive a regular cash bonus from a major windfarm project north of Bombala.
Article available here.
BLoW: ‘Back Local Windfarms’
Amidst all the fear mongering, its always refreshing to see local groups form in support of local wind projects. This one is from the West Midlands in the UK.
Wind farms: “think YIMBY, not NIMBY: Yes, in my back yard”
Instead of getting caught in fear and paranoia over wind farms, the people of the Italian town of Tocco have been embracing it. The town has been able to offer local residents cheap public services and subsidised amenities because of the success of the local wind turbines.
The town makes so much electricity from wind power that it is able to sell off what it does not need and pump the profits back into local services.
A video report is available here
Landowner backs wind farm project in spite of ‘harrassment’
Article available here.
Survey shows support for wind farm in UK inspite of ‘noisy’ opposition (Jan 2011)
Article available here.
farmers organisation shows support for wind farms
Article available here.
Wind change in rural Victoria
“Wind turbines and dozens of them, sprinkled across Victoria’s southern coastline and non-coastal countryside. They are the picture of beauty, optimism and hope for the future.
The Wind Farm I visited last week at Codrington, near Portland in the state’s south west, was the first 100% private investment in a wind farm in Australia.
This is positive, progressive stuff – a symbol of forward-thinking in our society and movement away from climate-killing coal mines and toward sustainable, planet-friendly energy sources.
Another reason it’s great to see so many wind turbines springing up in Victoria is because the award for the worst greenhouse gas polluting coal-fired state in the country goes to that state. Not only does Victoria have the highest rate of greenhouse pollution in Australia, it has one of the highest rates in the world, grace of its heavy reliance on coal and heavy production of aluminium.
On the same day I visited Codrington Wind Farm, I also saw my first ever brown coal station. Seeing it made me sad: greed, capitalism, environmental damage and an unliveable planet were just some of the images and thoughts that came to mind”.
From Our Patch, by Philippa
Waubra wind farm. Image: FoE
AGL report backs wind farm benefits
An economic study says wind farm projects in the Hallett area of the mid-north of South Australia have helped arrest population decline.
The report commissioned by AGL and done by consultancy firm Sinclair Knight and Merz said wind farm projects had created dozens of jobs and nearly $90 million had been spent in the region.
AGL construction manager Mark Stephens said the report countered local concern that wind farms could drive people away from the region.
“We’re really proud of the fact that our contribution to the community through the development of these farms has clearly gone beyond the supply of the clean, renewable energy and is having a really good benefit and is actually having a good benefit in terms of the financial effect on the community and also the employment,” he said.
Mr Stephens said the report concluded more spending and jobs could be expected if a fifth part of the project, called Hallett 3, were approved.
“I guess we kind of suspected that these findings were the case, but it’s nice to have them confirmed and we didn’t actually know how much and what the quantifications associated with these knock-on effects were,” he said.
14 July 2010
Source: ABC.
jenny c
June 13, 2011
If you want to get involved with building support for renewables, there are lots of people in Victoria plugging into the 100% renewable energy campaign. http://www.100percent.org.au
they are self-started groups that are building community support for legislation and funding that will provide security for investment in the renewable energy sector. If you love renewable energy and you’d like to see more of it – have a look and get involved. You only need a few people to get involved – the tools that you learn could help with other local advocacy for a renewable project that your community is planning.
It has at present over 100 community groups Australia wide – it is non-partisan and started by community people who are acting collaboratively from the local to the national to create change.
join in! – it beats arguing with sceptics any day!