Site Discussions

What troubles me about solar and wind power is the amount of real estate they cover to generate power on a scale great enough to replace conventional generation plants. And in the Northeast, sunshine and wind are irregular at best, so something always needs to be available as backup.

People also seem to think that solar and wind power do no environmental damage. Maybe not after they are installed, but putting them in—at a large scale—requires a great deal of industrial production and transportation, all involving fossil fuels, as well as mashing up the locality with trucks and cranes, installing permanent access roads, etc. And how much gasoline would be consumed every summer to keep field and forest from overtaking the open space of a solar farm?

Has anyone yet figured out how to avoid bird, insect, and bat mortality from wind turbines?

I would be interested in seeing a comparison of how much acreage is actually used to run the Northern Pass lines vs. how much acreage and how many hilltops would be needed for the same amount of power via solar and wind. Is that information available anywhere?

I didn’t realize the importance of dandelions to bees until I read this article.  How unfortunate for the bees that this plant is dreaded by those who seek the perfect lawn.

It’s good to see Brian finally recognizes the wonder chickadees bring to the world.  I’m sure Brian doesn’t remember me, but in a conversation more than 5 years ago, he made a disparaging remark about the all so common chickadee and how everyone has them at their feeders.  Ever since I’ve been going to write an ode to this friendly, spirited bird, so obviously full of the joy of life.  I haven’t witnessed the mobbing, but chickadees are the friendliest birds in my section of the woods.  Instead of quietly devouring bird seed, like nuthatches and blue jays do, they cheerfully call everyone to the feast they have found.  Being dare devils, they fly in for a seed at a feeder inches from my head, while I fill another.  They will also land on your hand for a seed, if you stand still long enough, being great teachers of patience.  I know because I’ve done it twice.  Still, unlike ducks who will follow anyone around looking for more handouts, the chickadee is always a free spirit, flying back to shelter with it’s bounty.  Sure it’s fun to catch a glimpse of a reclusive bird that lives far in the woods.  Though it it technically true of every species, if the chickadee were to disappear the world would be a much sadder place.

Solar and wind power are not yet cost effective but would be when sufficiently developed and used…but we have powerful oil companies lobbying against them, and seemingly no public will and patience to withstand them.  No energy source is free from either harmful or nuisance effects, but solar and wind seem to offer the safest-for-the-planet source.  For that I would be willing to ‘sacrifice’ some scenery for the common good. 
  We live in the middle of Marcellus gas drilling; we see and feel the negative affects from it, will not benefit monitarily from it.  Our friends who will benefit hate it…hate the destruction, degradation, everything about it.  I hate the sacrifices we’re all making to have this gas produced and used, knowing that the primary benefactors from the gas drilling will be the oil companies.  Local economies, private citizens will benefit to some degree, but in what proportion to the cost of what is lost to them and to the planet we all inhabit?  Marcellus gas is another finite power source, and its production is another ‘mess’ we’re leaving for our children to deal with.  Why are we not putting our efforts toward a clean, constant energy source?  See above paragraph!

A very much needed discussion. In my town very recently there has been serious debate about the siting of wind turbines. Most of the inhabitants are aware of the almost constant wind flow at the projected sites.Both locations are at relatively high elevation. Both are places townsfolk like to walk when in need of a pleasant breeze on sultry days, or a magnificent view for miles in any direction. One site is on school property. The other is on a huge piece of land owned by a large fraternal organization. Town folks raised a ruckus about rather questionable ill effects caused by the turbines “flicker effects”. Nothing is settled yet. The NIMBYS have a way of shifting much attention to nit picking instead of necessary action on behalf of our environment and our populace at large.

What a wonderful description not only of nature, but of children… and the opportunities we have to let them learn.

A friend e-mailed your article to me as I live on the projected route of the Northern Pass Project.  My husband and I have invested our life savings in a home with a beautiful mountain view.  135 foot steel transmission powers will pass right through my property and I guess we are considered NIMBY’s; however, first of all it appears to me that your analogy comparing the tragedy in the Delta to the Northern Pass Project is apples versus oranges.  Mother Nature was the cause of the crisis in the Delta while Hydro Quebec, which is owned by the Canadian Government stands to make billions and billions of profit at the expense of thousands of individuals like my husband and me, whose property values will be destroyed, pristine landscape destroyed, refinancing of homes unobtainable as well as reverse mortgages not given, and ecotourism hurt.  The natural disaster which occurred along the Delta and the actions taken were unavoidable, while the actions proposed by the Northern Pass Project and resulting damages are avoidable as the transmission lines could be buried, however, Hydro Quebec elects to make a greater profit at the expense of New Hampshire residents.  Hopefully, the victims of the Midwest disaster will be able to rebuild with the help of our government and while the flooding will subside, the scar across New Hampshire will be permanent.

This piece is a rhetorical pastiche attempting to connect mostly unrelated things.  Its attempted dialectics show little understanding of the actual geographic or social issues.  Few of the poor MS & AR counties along the river are actually suffering in any great degree from the flooding, which is contained within the levees in all but a few places.  Where flooding is occurring, poor and rich alike are suffering, and these are mostly farmers.  Whether they are rural, urban,rich or poor seems a ridiculous distinction to make. 

Anyone who has spent much time aroung the river understands its long term risks.  The choice to open up designated floodways to flooding is an unfortunate, but long anticipated eventuality.  If you farm or choose to live in a designated floodway, sooner or later you are going to be flooded.  Those are the risks you take.  Ergo the acceptance of same. 

Mississippi flooding has nothing to do with class warfare. BTW, New Orleans and Baton Rouge are full of poor urban people.  The economic infrastructure threatened by flooding is far more important to the common good than the lightly populated floodways.

There is a way to preserve New Hampshire’s natural beauty and prevent the takeover of private citizens’ property for the benefit of a corporation. (And to answer a question posed earlier in the blog: Yes, takeover of private property by eminent domain has been proposed by the Northern Pass people.)  The Northern Pass could bury its lines anywhere they spoil a public view, or anyplace where the sight of the Northern Pass’s power lines lowers the value that people paid extra money to enjoy.  If you don’t believe views are worth money, just ask a realtor—or the homeowner who pays taxes extra for a view. 

Moreover, NH’s unspoiled mountain vistas have enormous economic impact on the state—impact that affects both rural and urban dwellers.  Visitors do not come to northern New Hampshire to see huge power transmission lines.  If they wanted to see that, they could stay in the cities.

New Hampshire’s Travel and Tourism Department estimates that, on average, each tourist spends $81.76 every day they’re in the state.  A recent Granite State Ambassador case study cites New Hampshire’s tourism industry as the state’s second largest employer. Tourists to this state pay over $125 million in rooms and meals taxes each year, all of which goes directly into the General Fund. Tourism and the services it requires are the source of $4.35 billion to the state’s economy.

Since tourism depends on unspoiled scenic beauty, tampering with it is economically foolhardy. 

Burying the Northern Pass’s power lines is a compromise that would allow New Hampshire’s citizens to reap the benefits of cheaper energy without having the beauty of their mountains and towns diminished. The Project’s planners claim that burying the lines is too expensive, but what else would they be expected to say about costs that narrow their profits?  Over time, the Project will surely make enough profit to amortize the extra costs it will incur. By contrast, New England’s scenic beauty, once it is lost, can never be regained.

Over 27% of the Granite State’s economy depends on preserving New Hampshire’s unspoiled natural majesty. Burying the lines would be a win-win.  This is not a time to sit back in silence and let one of America’s most scenic treasures, the White Mountains, be sacrificed to corporate profits.  The ultimate costs to the public, rural and urban alike, will be anything but cheap.

Jacqueline Simon
Ashland, NH

There were some prelimary discussions about the possibility of a wind energy site along the mountain ridge that I look at every day from my house on the hill. Would that be an eyesore or would it look like a more natural way to generate power? I can’t help but wonder how people several generations felt when power lines started being put up everywhere to bring electricity to homes & farms. Did they view these as eyesores at the time? We grew up with them and accepted them as a part of the way it is. Would the next generations do the same?
It is a dilemma! Unfortunately we have to start making those hard decisions. For me, I think I could look out at a wind energy site and see it as an attempt to go gentle on the earth.

The bottom line is that consumers were more valuable in the eyes of “the powers that be” than were the producers. Let’s see the casinos grow a little wheat, or corn or cotton. And let’s listen to the folks whose properties were spared squall about food prices when the crops come up short.

The more you get involved with the natural world around you, the more you grow to love and protect it.  These children, in acting out their favorite species, were no longer “only human” on that blue-skied day, but also the animals they represented.  The air touched their “wings”, and the snow and dried grasses enveloped imagined “claws” or delicate “paws”.  Their “food” came from the trees and fields and streams around them.  I am now in my mid-sixties, but similar youthful experiences and imaginings in growing up on a Vermont farm have helped to keep me focused on conservation, preservation, and appreciation in a way that I might neverhave done, had I not been exposed to the gifts of nature in those early developmental years.  Every generation needs and deserves such an opportunity .

I believe there is no right or wrong answer. I live in NYC and have a cabin retreat with several hundred acres of woods and fields in upstate NY (Marcellus shale territory). I like the NYC activity but also appreciate the upstate rural community. NYC water can’t be beat and fresh well water is a necessity. Not rich and can use “gas” money, but at what expense? Am I pro-drilling, anti-drilling? As a NYC resident I oppose gas drilling because of potential dangers to the water supply, but am in favor of gas drilling to ensure low-cost clean energy. As a rural landowner I oppose gas drilling because of environmental concerns but am in favor because of economic concerns. I guess if it came to a vote I would vote yes and my wife would vote no. Go figure

Very good article.  My only quibble is the alligation that the native people in northern quebec are against the hydro projects.  This is not true.  While there is some, mostly from away, who do complain about the diversion of the water most do not.
I have visited Chisabi (not the correct spelling) and have found that the lives and standard of living has improved.  Evan the “old ways” of summer migrations for hunting and fishing are still praciced by those who wish. In winter the village privde warm housing, education and health care as well as an active social environment.

Few want to go back to the old life…an those who wish to can.

The Quebec hydro project have by and large been a win win for all.

A wonderful article, and thank you for writing it. In particular, thank you for noting that the communities being flooded are largely poor and rural, which most reports have not pointed out. I have no answers to the energy analogy, but I do think that alternative energy, like wind and solar, really is needed, my personal criterion being do the least harm to people and the planet. It would be preferable if the issues surrounding these forms of energy generation were more sensitively addressed. Windmill size—do they really have to be so huge, noisy, etc.? (Another analogy: As a non-skier, I view the stripes and hardware to accommodate skiing, snowboarding, etc. a blight on the beautiful mountains. Why are they okay, but not windmills?)  Siting anywhere is always tricky, as what is okay for some isn’t for others. Pitting rural against urban also is not helpful; there are always tradeoffs that are not to everyone’s liking, different perspectives have validity, and as you note, sometimes we have to consider the common good. Texas and Louisiana used to say to the northeast “Let them freeze in the dark.” Should we now be saying let them flood? Let people who live differently from us suffer? It will continue to become a meaner and more fragmented world if we do not also take distant places into consideration, including the cost of hydropower to the native peoples in Quebec. The art of greater good and compromise continues to fade, and the reality of ever-growing populations and technologies tells us that from buggy whips to unspoiled open spaces, some things will disappear or change. As I said, I have no answers, just hopes and preferences.

Great conversation starter. I’ve been following the discussions around Northern Pass with more than casual interest, and I believe you’ve hit the nail on the head: we city-folk like cheap power, but we don’t want to pay the social or environmental costs of that power. I want my fridge to keep running, but I don’t want ugly, EMF-producing transmission lines in my backyard.

Our neighbors to the south are no different. Just last week, the Connecticut Siting Council rejected a proposal to build the state’s first commercial wind farm, saying the turbines would mar the landscape (http://www.hartfordbusiness.com/news18442.html). Like me, the ratepayers of southern New England want to have their power, but without the visual impacts.

This tension is more basic than urban versus rural. Ultimately, it comes back the all-too-human desire to reap the benefit without paying the full cost.

exactly whose land would be taken here?  I thought the Northern Pass ran along existing rights-of-way

Carolyn: Nothing has been there since the beginning of time. On the contrary organisms have been moving into new habitats from the beginning and that is good. There is nothing wrong with a constant flux of introduced species into new habitats, in moderation. They can be absorbed gradually by the community and become part of the web of life (food chain, energy flow).
The trouble with introductions is that we, humans, have been doing this in massive amounts. The planet has not seen such a thing ever before. Ecosystems cannot take such enormous alterations of the balance that took millions of years to accomplish.
That is why I made the comparison with a musical piece in which you can introduce a fragment from another piece and weave it into it until it works properly. But, if you tried to introduce a large number of alien pieces it may be too much. It would require huge amounts of time to knit it together again and then it would be an entirely different composition.
Sometimes it is impossible to do anything about the aliens that have already been introduced and established. But we should try our best to prevent new introductions from happening.

I just wanted to say what a great magazine with some fascinating articles. It gives a greater understanding of woodland/forest habitats in general.

Yes, I have come to the same sort of peace with litter. That doesn’t mean that I don’t pick up truckloads of it, just that it doesn’t spoil what would otherwise be a beautiful day outdoors.