| Europeans Blown Away by Govt-Funded Wind Farms | | Print | |
| Written by Rebecca Terrell | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tuesday, 29 September 2009 02:00 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The European Platform Against Windfarms (EPAW), along with four other environmental groups, organized the event "to denounce the massacre of our national and cultural heritage by the wind farm scourge." Though protestors hailed from France, Britain, Belgium, Holland, and Italy, the event received very little media coverage. EPAW is an alliance of organizations from 18 European countries, both members and non-members of the European Union, with supporters in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Puerto Rico, and Australia. Founded in 2008, the group says its aim is to oppose taxpayer-funded wind farms. It calls the projects “state vandalism” because of their damaging social, economic, and environmental effects. This past weekend's demonstration was staged at one of France's most beloved landmarks and tourist destinations, Mont-Saint-Michel. "The wind industry will distort this Unesco world heritage site. Visible over 20 miles, these turbines would peak at 225 meters (approximately 738 feet) on the ridges bordering the bay shores," explains Jean-Louis Butre, EPAW chairman, as quoted on the event website. The top spire of Mont-Saint-Michel rises to 170 meters (about 557 feet), and protestors argue the turbines would ruin the view of the site from both land and sea as well as the view from the world-famous landmark. "The wind industry is neither viable, liveable nor fair," he said, calling the proposed project waste of resources and a massacre of the French landscape. Event attendees carried banners accusing government officials of opportunism with such messages as “Mr. Sarkozy, your slot machines devastate the country,” “Our country is not for sale,” and “When operators become predators.” Others called the turbines “useless, expensive and harmful.” Another group that helped to organize the event, the Federation Environnment Durable (FED), or the "Federation for Environmental Sustainability," has identified 11 similar projects planned by the European Union in France. In May, EPAW petitioned the European Union to place a moratorium on all planned wind projects, arguing that the costs of wind energy far outweigh its advantages. The letter explained that although EPAW supports effective renewable energy proposals, wind projects are not proven to be reliable. EPAW says that government funding and pressure from financial and ideological interest groups are the only reasons the wind industry can function. Their letter argued that wind farms degrade the environment, contribute only insignificantly to the reduction of CO2, involve expensive transmission system upgrades, and "devour colossal amounts of public money," creating an artificial market. EPAW went on to request that the European Union commission an independent study to evaluate the effect of wind farms on carbon savings and the economic, environmental and social impact they have on their surroundings. The letter was answered in July by Matthias Ruete, the Director General for Energy and Transport, who refuted EPAW's scientifically based claims against wind energy with citations from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and a report from the European Commission’s Strategic Energy Review. Though Ruete acknowledged the importance of maintaining environmental integrity around wind farms, he dodged the issue by claiming it is the responsibility of local authorities to consult with necessary stakeholders in regard to these aspects of individual wind projects.
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Flu-Bird
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Between 500 and 1,000 protesters gathered last weekend at Mont-Saint-Michel in France to demonstrate against plans to build a wind farm along the Normandy coast. They say it would be a useless eyesore disfiguring the bay area.
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Wind farm foolery And many of those eco-freaks have supported wind farms inplace of nucular energy but the facts that wind turbines are hazerdous to birds and their unreliable as well so what will the idiots from GREENPEACE do now that wind farms are not so enviromentaly freindly as the green wackos have claimed they are |
mark duchamp
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Director, Climate Change and Alternative Energies You are to be congratulated for reporting an event that the media at large ignored. Political correctness has no business meddling with energy policy, engineering, and science. Windfarms are a scam. Dr Etherington demonstrated that much in his new book "The Windfarm Scam". He should know what he is talking about: before retiring he was professor of ecology at the University of Wales. |
Lisa Linowes
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executive director Individuals worldwide are becoming increasingly concerned with the impacts of wind energy development on families, communities, and our natural resources. It's time to stop the NIMBY name calling and take steps to understand the issues. While wind may be renewable, our landscapes and quality of life are not. Thank you for covering this story. |
still free
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Did anyone notice? So the media gave very little press coverage to the story? Gee, doesn't that sound familiar? Did "our people" meet with their people, or vice versa? As for the French landscape, not to worry--the "eco-freaks" will find a "eco-solution." Why look what they did for us with the cell phone towers. Don't they look lovely with the fake trees mounted on them? |
Pat Swords
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BE CEng FIChemE CEnv MIEMA Fellow of Institute of Chemical Engineers and Chartered Environmentalist The European Union does have a target of 20% of energy to be sourced from renewable sources by 2020. This ties in with other targets set by other Directives, such as the Landfill Directive or the Water Framework Directive, i.e. we also need to clean up the wastes going to landfills and slurries and sludges that enter the water courses, encourage some biomass on land that is not being productively used, etc. This is a win win situation in which environmental impact can be reduced and useful energy obtained. It is very very important to stress that wind energy is only one of the eleven technologies listed as renewable in the Directive on Renewable Energy (2009/28/EC), it may well make sense for an island community that is not connected to the national grid in order to supplement diesel fired generation. It does not and never will make economic or environmental sense for addition to an integrated optimised national grid. Furthermore it is essential to realise that there is no objective to obtain the other 80% of the EU's energy from renewable sources, to try and do so would be a breech of the EU's basic principles of consideration of costs, benefits, alternatives and principle of proportionality. Therefore the policy of the Union in this regard is Sustainable Energy, for instance Member States can go nuclear or try and develop a reliable and cost effective method of Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), best of luck to them with CCS. Wind energy is not an appropriate method of meeting the EU legislation in force!!! There are far better methods of meeting the targets set, one should start with the low hanging fruit, such as waste to energy via incinerators or anaerobic digestion of agricultural and food wastes. |
Frank Campbell
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... Wind is indeed a fraud. Australians are now suffering from the same infestation. |
Priscilla Park
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Mrs I hope someone is counting the birds and bats that are killed by the blades of the wind farms. Are these figures published? If so where? |
Helen Skeel Taylor
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... Sweden, Denmark, UK and many other nationalities participated as well. One cannot avert a disaster (the climate change) by creating another disaster (industrial wind power). It is as simple as that. |
Ivanhoe
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... This is just another occurance showing how programmed so many of us have become. The new world order and the forces behind it will us anything to subvert our Christian culture and bend it to their will. All the news seems to really boil down to the war between light and darkness. |
