North East Windmills


Without government subsidies to the wind industry,
there is no wind industry.

Proposed Wind Turbine Locations in Erie County PA

by

— Due to changes at Google this map is no longer available. —

Is Pioneer Green Energy trying to build a wind turbine near your home? Up until now, it’s been very difficult to get a direct answer to this question. We have asked our township supervisors and zoning administrator many times for this information and their response every time has been they don’t know or they haven’t seen a map or don’t know of any map. Well, in order to help out residents with questions, and, evidently, to help out our local officials who seem to be in the dark, we have an interactive map that shows every turbine presently planned in our area.

Every red flag you see on the map above is a 500 foot tall wind turbine. Wind developers are required to file a proposal with the FAA for every structure more than 200 feet tall that they are planning to build with exact location and height. Every turbine in our area, shown by these flags, was specified to the FAA as 499 feet tall.

Survey accuracy for each location is specified as 4D, which means within 250 feet horizontal and 50 feet vertical of the actual location, so the flags as shown on this map may be off as much as 250 feet in any direction from the exact position planned for each turbine.

Each turbine is also given a description which reads:

a 150.095 meter turbine as part of a 67 turbine wind project

That sounds like a few more than the 10 or 15 Pioneer has repeatedly said, but it does agree with the 67 locations shown on this map.

It’s interesting to note, the locations for each of these turbines was specified to the FAA on September 9, 2012. Most residents first saw the zoning map at a supervisors meeting in April of 2013 and the public hearing on the proposed wind energy zone was not held until September of 2013. Was the zone drawn up to accommodate the plans of the wind developer before taking into consideration any input from the public? Since the zone so neatly encompasses the proposed turbines, it makes it difficult to believe the supervisors and zoning officials had no knowledge of a map as they indicated on several occasions when asked by residents. The same question applies to the wind ordinance. Were setbacks proposed with known locations in mind?
Important: The information to create this map was never provided to residents by either Pioneer Green Energy or government officials in North East Township, despite repeated requests from residents to see where the turbines would be located. The location data comes directly from the FAA website, discovered during our own research and investigation.

It’s hard to understand why local officials and wind developers are so reluctant to share this information. If they truly believe wind turbines are beneficial to a community, you would think they would be proud to show local residents where they intend to build. Of course, if they don’t really believe that, then they would be more likely to keep the information out of the public eye as long as possible, but if we are going to have an intelligent and informed discussion, then this information must be available for everyone to see.

Comments

  1. Pioneer Green did not share turbines locations with us here in Somerset County Maryland despite claims of working with residents. After filing applications with the FAA, we were able to develop a map according to the FAA coordinates and heights. This followed several attempts to get maps from our County Commissioners and Planning and Zoning. Local leaders do not want to know details about projects because they believe it keeps their hands cleaner.When I spoke with Jerry Boston, the County Commissioners whose district the turbines are located, he did not even ask to see it.
    I suggest to try to share the map with your County Commissioners and Planning & Zoning to see what reaction you get.