It's conceivable that most people are disgusted by the events that have
unfolded at Vermont Yankee, including (but not limited to) the tritium
leak that finally put lawmakers over their limits of what number of
problems can be tolerated before taking major legislative action against
VY.
With Hydro-Quebec, the displacement of native people along with the
destructive transformation of wetlands and boreal forest habitat struck
some of us as an unconscionable trade-off when it was first announced
two decades ago that Vermont would be getting a significant amount of
its power from a foreign pseudo-clean source.
During the interval, the fallacy of "clean hydroelectric power" has been
revealed repeatedly across America and the world (with some dams in the
country being dismantled in order to restore ecosystemic health). Now,
in order to be local and as cleanly green as possible, we must pursue
solar, wind and hopefully biomass as solutions to "dirty" energy
produced from fossil fuels or ruined riparian ecosystems imported from a
hundred or more miles away.
In the deeply folded topography of Appalachia, wind towers constructed
for more than one household's energy supply would only work along
ridgelines. They do not belong on the spine of the Green Mountains for
similar reasons that the proposed Green Mountain Parkway was denied by
statewide referendum some 75 years ago. Development there of any sort
would also be in direct conflict with the aesthetics of the Long Trail
and with wilderness area designations in the Green Mountain National
Forest and places like Camel's Hump State Park (the southern end of
which extends to Appalachian Gap).
Conversely, a quick online search reveals that the Northfield Ridge has
only one established recreational trail, a V.A.S.T. snowmachine route
that traverses the range several miles north of Scrag Mountain. What,
then, would wind towers disturb? If there is critical habitat at stake
for an endangered species of wildlife such as Bicknell's thrush at
stake, this could substantially alter the picture.
However, if all that's at risk are our ideals of what constitutes a
pastoral landscape that has to import power from distant, non-renewable,
carbon-spewing or radiation-leaking sources, what constitutes the
uglier scenario is a matter of semantics and perspective. Wind towers
would set an example to the throngs visiting our Valley that
alternatives to coal, nuclear and hydro do exist in the real world
instead of just in theory and can produce electricity from our own
backyard.
Brian Aust lives in Waitsfield.
