First, it's worth reiterating that, as Mr. Male himself stated, such
installations are not "farms." They are industrial installations with
footprints (about 25 acres for the Northfield Ridge facility) and
terrain disruption comparable to nuclear generators and coal-fired
plants. (One million pounds of explosives were required to build a
12-turbine, Lempster, NH, facility. Thousands of truck trips hauled
thousands of tons of aggregate and cement for roads and turbine
platforms. Locals and visitors who once enjoyed the backcountry there
now find locked gates and "No Trespassing" signs.)
This is not to say that industrial facilities are, a priori, bad. They
have their places. It is to point out that they are not farms and that
they have major environmental impacts.
IMPACT PROPERTY VALUES
They also impact property values. Much available data on the subject is
biased for, or against, industrial wind power plants. More reliable data
sources do exist here and abroad that have nothing to gain by helping
promoters or opponents. Australia, for example, has monitored the
impacts of industrial wind facilities for a decade. According to Alan
Hives, a land valuer (assessor) with 25 years' experience, industrial
wind facilities "have a very large impact on the look of the country,
but the change in land value will depend on the site, the situation and
the circumstances."
In purely agricultural areas, "the impact on land value had been
insignificant."
But - and this is the huge but that Valley select boards, planning
commissions, and voters need to remember - the more an area's value is
lifestyle-based, the more property is devalued. In coastal Australian
areas with high lifestyle qualities, industrial wind power plants
reduced property values by up to one-third.
Not all property is created equal. Palm Springs deserts and New Jersey
barrens and Australian outback farms will suffer less from industrial
power installations than will oceanfront land and Vermont's
irreplaceable mountains and valleys. Common sense suggests this and hard
data proves it. Rutlanders and Ira residents knew it when they decided
against a major industrial wind facility in their area.
DEVALUATIONS
A Northfield Ridge industrial power facility could inflict similar
devaluation on every property situated on the ridge's western slope,
from Roxbury Gap Road all the way to Moretown. Properties down in The
Valley, closer to the Mad River, could see similar, if smaller,
devaluations. And what of the proximal businesses that depend on the
area's natural beauty? Would people be as likely to wed where the
dominant viewscape was an industrial power facility, so loud at times
that couples might have to shout their vows?
Courts here and abroad are another source of objective information. Mrs.
Jane Davis, a 52-year-old retired National Health Service nurse, and
her husband lived on a small farm in England's rural Lincolnshire
district. In 2006, their property was valued at $240,000. That same
year, an industrial wind power facility was built 1,000 yards away.
Having received reassurances from developers, the Davises were
supporters: "We did not object to the wind farm in the planning stage as
we did not believe that there would be any issues for us, and we
believed that wind power was a good way of meeting the energy gap." Two
years later, in a landmark case, the Davis's property was declared
worthless by the regional tribunal responsible for assessing tax
valuations. (Analogous to our Department of Taxes). Part of the ruling:
"It was apparent from the evidence submitted that the construction of
the windfarm 930 metres away from the appeal dwellings had had a
significant detrimental effect on the Appellants' quiet enjoyment of
their properties."
To support their claims, the Davises kept a daily journal for one year,
viewable at www.windaction.org/documents/14202. All should read this
invaluable document. It is a chilling chronicle of an industrial
facility's destructive power when ill-sited. Her entry for July 22,
2007: "Woken at 04.37, ears pulsing, whoosh, throb and house humming. I
cried."
As Bob Messner noted last week, industrial wind power is a valuable
renewable energy source with positive potential-in the right places. A
community whose character and economy are lifestyle-based is not one.
Another of Jane Davis' comments makes a good closer: "For people living
near wind farms, both now and in the future, it will be a disaster....
This isn't about Nimbyism, but the rights of ordinary people to live a
normal life."
Tabor lives in Waitsfield.
