US town rejects solar farm

[Jimbuna]

Because it will 'suck up all the sun'

http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2015/12/14/us-town-rejects-solar-farm-because-it-will-suck-all-sun

Have I slept through Xmas and New Year and woken up in April :hmm2:

[AVGWarhawk]

And these people vote for presidents! :doh:

[Commander Wallace]

http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2015/12/14/us-town-rejects-solar-farm-because-it-will-suck-all-sun

Have I slept through Xmas and New Year and woken up in April :hmm2:

Suck up all the sun ? Some people have way too much time on their hands. :roll:

[Rockstar]

Actually some people dont know enough about solar panels and cant properly express their fears.

BUT! The real problem it would seem stems from more than just uneducated bumpkins from North Carolina thinking solar panels will soak up all of the sun's rays. It would appear to me the towns people are seeing the results from three other solar farms already in place around their town and said enough is enough.

"Jean Barnes said she represented many citizens who rejected any more solar farms coming to the Woodland area and presented a petition to the council.

Barnes asked that any future solar farm requests be placed on a referendum so the citizens can make the decision.

Mary Hobbs has been living in Woodland for 50 years and said she has watched it slowly becoming a ghost town with no job opportunities for young people.

She said her home is surrounded by solar farms and is no longer worth its value because of those facilities.

She added that the only people profiting are the landowners who sell their land, the solar companies, and the electric companies.

We had a similar fight against wind farms. Told the companies to pack sand they went bust and never came back.

[AVGWarhawk]

Actually some people dont know enough about solar panels and cant properly express their fears.

BUT! The real problem it would seem stems from more than just uneducated bumpkins from North Carolina thinking solar panels will soak up all of the sun's rays. It would appear to me the towns people are seeing the results from three other solar farms already in place around their town and said enough is enough.



We had a similar fight against wind farms. Told the companies to pack sand they went bust and never came back.


I don't think, legally, the town can say no. My neighborhood is overseen by a HOA(Home Owners Association). The new must have thing is solar panels on your roof. Ugly as hell but the HOA can not say no to solar panels per government regulations/laws on sustainable energy. The sad part of these panels is the company that installs them has a 20 year contract with the homeowner. If the homeowner needs to sell they are still stuck with the 20 year contract or need to sell it as a package to the next owner. Plus, the company installing is getting the tax credits from the government(millions) and not the home owner.

[Aktungbby]

Suck up all the sun ? Some people have way too much time on their hands. :roll:Could u enlighten us on that statement? :D https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e4/Aten_disk.jpg/250px-Aten_disk.jpg (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Aten_disk.jpg)https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b8/KV55_scull.jpg/220px-KV55_scull.jpg (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:KV55_scull.jpg)good ol' Akhenaton: 3350 years later(Tut's daddy) Sun power was a big deal back then too!:O:

[AVGWarhawk]

Could u enlighten us on that statement? :D https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e4/Aten_disk.jpg/250px-Aten_disk.jpg (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Aten_disk.jpg)https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b8/KV55_scull.jpg/220px-KV55_scull.jpg (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:KV55_scull.jpg)good ol' Akhenaton: 3350 years later(Tut's daddy) Sun power was a big deal back then too!:O:



Ra was considered the god of sun. Not much as a power source to operate things. :hmmm:

[August]

I'd have been happy to claim that windmills cause gall stones or anything else if it would have worked to defeat their placement on Mt. Passadumkeag up near my place in Maine.

Hey they lied about it not marring the view and they lied about it not killing birds and they lied about utility rates not skyrocketing like they have so why can't I lie about why I oppose them?

Of course the media (read Bangor Daily News) would have happily ignored 99 reasoned arguments and concentrated on that objection as representative because that is what they do.

It's gone from this
https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1255/1394275192_22bfb1d4db_b.jpg

to this

http://api.ning.com/files/DrCKhHEam13aHWO3cXS6AAKSbuTC0HWn4ZtjntJ0iBBgQtpwaV ezpBtm8lyqOLE7pWg3KsogfEvLndD1I8A4a1OXzGjPOxIk/Soponac.bmp

:nope:

[STEED]

Another local woman named Jane Mann who was identified as a retired school teacher expressed genuine fears plants in the area would not get enough sunlight to perform photosynthesis if the solar project was approved.

I wonder what the Green Party would say. :hmmm:

[Rockstar]

I don't think, legally, the town can say no. My neighborhood is overseen by a HOA(Home Owners Association). The new must have thing is solar panels on your roof. Ugly as hell but the HOA can not say no to solar panels per government regulations/laws on sustainable energy. The sad part of these panels is the company that installs them has a 20 year contract with the homeowner. If the homeowner needs to sell they are still stuck with the 20 year contract or need to sell it as a package to the next owner. Plus, the company installing is getting the tax credits from the government(millions) and not the home owner.


Before the company could build the town had to approve rezoning the future construction site from agriculture to industrial. They did 't and I believe that sent the Solar company packing.

[Betonov]

Actually some people dont know enough about solar panels and cant properly express their fears.

BUT! The real problem it would seem stems from more than just uneducated bumpkins from North Carolina thinking solar panels will soak up all of the sun's rays. It would appear to me the towns people are seeing the results from three other solar farms already in place around their town and said enough is enough.


Media.
Focus on the crackpots.

I've read somewhere, can't remember exactly where, that the real reason the town is resisting it because the area for the solar farm is so far away from existing infrastructure that to hook up the town to the grid would cost more than the budget allows.

Solar farms are a waste of space. Literally.
You have a technology where you can put a small powerplant on every house in the area, sell the owner power at a reduced cost and send the surplus into the grid.
But no, lets destroy entire acres of nature or arable land for an overlay of an existing urban area.

[Mike Abberton]

The engineering company I work for has done some support work for solar projects, but these projects are generally completed at sites which are already of limited use/undesirable, predominantly closed landfills.

I agree that turning woodlands, pastures, or farmland into solar farms is not the best way to go.

[AVGWarhawk]

Before the company could build the town had to approve rezoning the future construction site from agriculture to industrial. They did 't and I believe that sent the Solar company packing.


Darn zoning can be great to have or an issue down the road.

Elkins WV. Skyline destroyed. But hey, the lights are on!

http://www.windturbinesyndrome.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Laurel_Mountain_1-400x346-428x374.jpg

[STEED]

Darn zoning can be great to have or an issue down the road.

Elkins WV. Skyline destroyed. But hey, the lights are on!

http://www.windturbinesyndrome.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Laurel_Mountain_1-400x346-428x374.jpg

Pig ugly wind farms.

[AVGWarhawk]

Pig ugly wind farms.

I have seen these in person. I agree. Pig ugly. Not to mention each has a strobe light for alerting aircraft. It looks like Close Encounters of the Third Kind at night.

http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--SMcpqJSd--/198nym1t33qebjpg.jpg

[Aktungbby]

On the way to mom-in-laws' house near palm springshttps://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c7/San_Gorgonio_Pass_Wind_Farm_IMG_0504.JPG/220px-San_Gorgonio_Pass_Wind_Farm_IMG_0504.JPG (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:San_Gorgonio_Pass_Wind_Farm_IMG_0504.JPG) & worse nearby at san Gorgonio Pass https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/75/San_gorgonio_pass_wind_farm_california_pano.jpg/1920px-San_gorgonio_pass_wind_farm_california_pano.jpg

[AVGWarhawk]

Sheesh...waiting on scientific reports on what these wind farms do to the environment. I'm sure there is something. Bird kills, disrupted breeding of the Blue Booby or sonar disruption of the bottle nosed dolphin.

[Betonov]

Sheesh...waiting on scientific reports on what these wind farms do to the environment. I'm sure there is something. Bird kills, disrupted breeding of the Blue Booby or sonar disruption of the bottle nosed dolphin.

Forget that. The amount of chemicals needed to produce one windmill blade is abhoring.
We made master models and ended up with tons of waste, non-reacted resin, used paint thiner, bad batches etc. and then someone has to make the mould and then someone has to make the blade. Not to mention our CNC milling machine used more power than a windmill will generate in 5 years.

[Rockstar]

http://www.safeforsomerset.org

We had us a good old fashioned uprising here in Somerset County some very knowledgable people banded together and threw the money grubbing bums out.

If you hear about wind farms coming to a town near you. I recommend you read some at the link above.

[STEED]

We had us a good old fashioned uprising here in Somerset County people banded together and threw the green energy bums out.

Well Done. :yeah:

[Pisces]

She also said no one had proved solar panels didn’t cause cancer.Well, go stand in the sun as much as you want all day. I'm sure it will do good for your complexion. I'll be happy to stand under the panels and catch all of those cancer rays.

[August]

http://www.safeforsomerset.org

We had us a good old fashioned uprising here in Somerset County some very knowledgable people banded together and threw the money grubbing bums out.

If you hear about wind farms coming to a town near you. I recommend you read some at the link above.

Yeah we tried to fight it too but lost.

https://www.facebook.com/BrakeWind/

[u crank]

Here on Prince Edward Island wind energy is a big deal. Our little island has no natural energy sources. Currently we buy energy form neighboring New Brunswick and it is delivered via cable under the Northumberland Strait. Most of that power is produced at the Point Lepreau Nuclear Generating Station. One thing we do have though is wind and lots of it. Currently 30% of our energy supply comes from wind energy and the plan is to get it to much higher levels. That means wind farms every where. There has been some opposition but the options for energy are limited here.

Funny thing about these wind farms. Last year my Daughter bought an old house next to the Hermanville wind farm. She made a nice little summer cottage out of it with lots of free labor from Dad. Since the house was there before the wind farm was built, she gets paid compensation from the company that built the farm. That compensation pays a substantial part of the mortgage on her property. I like it. :D

[vienna]

The tax credits being taken by the solar panel companies applies only if you lease the panels or have some sort of set up where you by the power from the solar companies in much the same way you pay for power from conventional sources. I don't know if it's the same everywhere in the US, but here, in California, if you buy and own the panels, you get the tax credits and any other credits that apply, not the solar company. In fact, there have been programs where excess power generated by privately owned home solar setups is fed back into the power grid and the homeowner either gets a credit on any power they may take from the grid, or, if they are entirely power self-sufficient, they receive payment for the excess power. There is one veteran-owned solar panel sales and installation company in Southern California whose ads make a sales point of the customers getting all applicable credits, not the what they call in their ads "the Wall Street Guys"...

The rise in electrical rates here in CA is due mainly to the power companies losing a substantial and growing amount of revenue as more and more homes and businesses are moving to self-sufficiency. As the revenues decrease, the power companies, rather than practice efficiencies and economies, are trying to make up for the shortfalls by raising the rates on conventional customers. A lot of the consumers in CA are beginning to call to question the actual need for these hikes and the burden placed upon the non-alternative base. It is going to be interesting to see how it all shakes out down the line...

An analog for the power companies shortfall woes can be found in those states where a substantial portion of revenue is derived from vehicle fuel taxes. The rising popularity of alternative fuel cars, electric, hybrid, CNG, etc., coupled with higher mileage efficient conventional engine cars is decreasing the sales of gasoline and diesel to such an extent state and local governments are fretting over their own shortfalls. As people are becoming more self-contained in their lives, the traditional modes of operations of business and government are fading and the power is going to the newer technologies and methods. Now that companies that once looked down their snouts at electric and hybrid vehicles such as Mercedes, Porsche, and BMW are fully embracing and devoting more of their R&D resources to that which they once disdained, it is only a matter of time until alternative vehicles will be far more common everyday. I would hate to be holding oil company stock in, say, twenty-five or so years from now...


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