wind farm

[topskills]

http://www.wiltshiretimes.co.uk/news/inyourtown/trowbridgenews/9181177.County_wind_farm_plan/


standby for an influx of NIMBY's and eco-mentalists!!

[Jim S]

standby for an influx of NIMBY's and eco-mentalists!!

I'm very sorry about this TS, but why shouldn't there be about this?
Westbury and the surrounding areas are fast becoming the eysore's of Wiltshire.
And so far, have yet to find many advantages for us collectively.
The new waste plant on the industrial. Wiltshires waste.
Relatively few local jobs, and don't hold your breath while you wait for a local recycling centre.
The proposed solar panel farm up the same area.
Benefits the landowner, and the company supplying the panels. But subsidised by us taxpayers
And now, a worse blot on the landscape, a windmill
Benefits the landowner, and the company supplying the windmills. But subsidised by us taxpayers.
And if you still believe in father xmas, power supplied to the local grid, is then sold on to the national grid, as they pay the best returns

[Tag]

I take your point Jim, but:

1) would you rather it was a coal fired station being built there?
2) where is your concern for the wider environment, or indeed the well being of future generations?  Future generations will need electricity AND a cleaner planet to live on

What would your solution be?  From the sounds of it, to plant some sort of energy production facility somewhere else!

[Mike Hawkins]

Couldn't we have a nuclear power station on the site of the old cement works?

We have had the rest of the cr*p thrown at us!

Personally, I do not support the wind farms. They are not efficient and cause environmental damage themselves!

AND, who is going to disentangle the pilots of the gliders and those other little things, when they get tangled in the sails as they launch themselves from the White Horse? 

I must agree with Jim S on this one.

[topskills]

i too neither support these giant wind farms or actually think they do any good at all!

i.e i hope there is an influx in this case unlike my annoyance at there influx on the bypass issue.

[Jim S]

 
Thanks for the points that you mentioned Tag.
Mike, you nearly came up with a solution for putting the cement works to better use, and this ties in with a solution by Tag.
If a modern coal powered power station was built there, a lot of the infrastructure is already in place. IE, the transportation of the fuel.
I am talking about a modern power station, not the type us old fogies remember as youngsters, gushing smoke and steam.
With the modern filtration technology, what were once harmfull waste byproducts being spewed into the atmosphere. These are now marketable byproducts.
Oh dear, but this slightly labour intensive, and we wouldn't want the local peasants being gainfully employed now would we?
This would make them too independent of the nanny state.
Sorry Mike but I personally do not endorse nuclear power stations. Their safety track record on the whole is not exactly unblemished. And the cost. Initially expensive to build, expensive to safely maintain, then there is the clean up cost at the end of there usefull safe working life.
We are already paying this in our fuel bills, so the more of these we build, the more our bill will go up.
This is not bad, for something that when first built, was hailed as a future power source that would provide virtually free energy
And Tag, I do have concerns about the future of the environment for my children, grandchildren and great children.
I realise that as humans, we have all become reliant on power as we know it. but in the future, other power sources may become available, perhaps safer, cheaper and more easily produced.
But this leads me to another human failing, it's called greed. We will always be lead down the path of the fat cats, because they can make more money from us.
These people have no real interest in the environment, only the size of their wallets.
This brings me to my choice of future power for our island. It is wave power, that was developed years ago.
It was called the duck, as basically it just bobbed around on the surface of the water, but was anchored to the sea bed.
Any wave, large or small, or even the surge of current was enough to rotate it about it's axis.
It was hailed as a success, even when it was trialled on lake windermere. But the downside that got it shelved, was the seemingly high cost of getting the energy provided back to shore.
Doesn't seem to bother them now though as offshore windfarms seem to be the in fashion thing at the moment.
As for protecting the environment, this "duck" device was a double whammy. Not only did it actually produce "free power" (apart from maintenance cost) the water behind it was extremely calmed.
For an island surround by water, that is rapidly eroding our coastlines, this could save the country £m's in sea defences.

So yes Tag, I would be liking to see the alternative placed somewhere else, but not so sure that those people who are losing their homes, land and living, would mind too much.

[Jim S]

Just a few further points to try and explain why I am against these monsterous blots on the landscape.
Before they have even started, REG Windpower has already started spouting lies and half truths. If there are windfarms in Oxfordshire that are supposidly the nearest, then why are they not shown on their website?
Could be sour grapes because someone else owns them?
And as the crow flies, the wind farm to the west of Norten Radstock in somerset, is nearer to us than anywhere in Oxfordshire is.

Quote "Rob Fellows, a PR consultant working for REG, said: “We absolutely want to talk to the community, and we will be meeting the community early on."
Will this be to explain to people who live locally, how to sue them for noise polution, like an increasingly large number of people have started doing?
These machines are not silent, they emit a low frequency  resonance which can carry a long distance. low level frequencies can be extremely damaging to humans, as well as
animals and birds.

[Mike Hawkins]

I like the idea of wave power, but I believe the taxpayer should pay the development cost to stop the energy companies making vast profits. In fact, on their past record of greed and price manipulation, I would like a law forbidding these people having anything to do with it. Perhaps, for once, I would support a truly nationalised (in the national interest) provider.

[Jim S]

I would like a law forbidding these people having anything to do with it. Perhaps, for once, I would support a truly nationalised (in the national interest) provider.

But Mike, the whole idea of privatisation was to develop competition so that the consumer would benefit
Don't take me back to the days when rail freight subsidised passenger travel, and both were comparatively cheap
Just a few more of my points about my Anti-Windmill stance for those technically inclined.
The possible damage the machines may have on our environment seems to be getting hidden.
Until last year, I was able to look at the effects of horizontal vortex that were carried out in wind tunnels.
Now, all these films have disappeared from u-tube.
A single vortex, can cause problems as we know with the effects of a tornado.
But the combined effects of multiple vortex can be much more serious should they ever tune in together.
Oh, hey, forgot that Dyson knows this already, and that is what he bases his vacuum cleaners on.
That aside, your right Mike as to their inefficiency. They only work at a limited wind speed, to little and they don't work.
Too much, and they have to feather them and shut them down.
Look at last winter, when we needed them most, they produced the least of all our power.

[Jim S]

Looks like something else these Wind Farm owners don't want us to know about.
http://www.wiltshiretimes.co.uk/news/national/9393165.Wind_farm_damages_action_settled/
Settle quietly out of court, so that the true impact of these monstrosities is not made too public

[Mike Hawkins]

Looks like something else these Wind Farm owners don't want us to know about.

There is a lot the wind farm owners, the Green lobby and the Government don't want us to know about their dire predictions and their "utopian" solutions to the problem (their claims to be the problem, NOT a genuine one)!

When you hear any claims by these people think "SAXO"  (the salt, not the car!!!)

[Jim S]

When I went too the exhibition given by REG windpower, they failed to point out what exactly could happen to these windmills when it got a little bit windy.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-south-scotland-16084013
This one apparently was turned off, and was being allowed to freewheel.

In the second link, there is obviously a major fault there. If you look at the direction the blades are facing on the destroyed windmill, they are opposite to the other two windmills. So surely this cannot be blamed on the wind.
This is happening more and more frequently throughout the world, as can be seen by increasingly more videos appearing on such media as *you-tube*, and by following windfarm links on the internet.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2071633/UK-weather-Britain-battered-winds-151mph.html

A very interesting letter has been published in this weeks WHN, with reference to the West Ashton wind farm.