Wind Wars Come to Coal Country
by Jeff McIntire-Strasburg, St. Louis, MO 
on 07.12.06
"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows." Many of us in the sustainability community love to believe Bob Dylan's maxim applies to the inevitability of a global transition to cleaner, more renewable forms of energy generation. Yet, as we've seen here at Treehugger, the harvesting of wind power brings out a variety of very passionate responses. Many believe that wind could provide a significant amount of clean energy, while others argue about land use, aesthetics, bird and bat kills, and corporate conspiracies using the promise of green power as a ruse to fleece consumers.
While much of this debate in the US has focused on the proposed massive offshore Cape Wind project, another proposed wind farm outside of Lewisburg, WV, has spurred the drawing of battle lines. Regular contributor to the Augusta (VA) Free Press Erik Curren takes a very detailed look at the prominent players in this unfolding drama, and suggests that we may be witnessing the handy work of players who also had a role in both defending Big Tobacco from science linking smoking and cancer, and disseminating claims of scientific uncertainty regarding global climate change.
The battle in West Virginia gets even more complex than others around the US because the Mountain State is such a large extractor and exporter of coal. So in addition to the typical arguments about birds and landscapes, some see the presence of a wind farm as a direct challenge to an industry deeply entwined in West Virginia's economy and culture. Typical environmental vs. corporate metaphors don't work as neatly as they might in other places, as wind opponents and supporters both seek the label of David to Goliaths represented by Big Coal and Big Wind. For instance, wind farm opponent (or, as he claims, supporter of "Responsible Wind,") Dave Buhrman believes his fellow concerned citizens face two Goliaths:
"When Coal River folks contacted me by e-mail last winter saying they wanted to join forces and have [Buhrman's organization Mountain Communities for Responsible Energy] champion their cause, too, I took it to the next meeting, and I was told (and agreed) that if we did not maintain a laser focus on opposing [the Beech Ridge wind farm] we would not stand any chance at all.Wind supporters believe there's only one Goliath, the immensely powerful coal industry. Curren, however, sees the Lewisburg battle as symbolic of much larger and more entrenched interests in both West Virginia and Washington, and interweaves the story of one town's debate with background on industry front groups and their tactics. Curren's article is a long but riveting read that illustrates that local energy issues involve many players outside of the particular locality, and that those players often have interests they find more pressing than a small town's infrastructure, economy and culture. The battle in Lewisburg will affect all of us, not because it will determine whether developers will build one wind farm near this eclectic town of 4,000 people, but because it's another skirmish in a larger war over how the US (and other countries) will transition away from a fossil-fuel based economy to one that values conservation and renewable generation. :: Augusta Free Press via DeSmog Blog"Big coal is a huge entrenched Goliath and virtually inseparable from visions of Southern West Virginia. Big wind is a newcomer to our state with enough backing and power to be considered a formidable Goliath in itself."
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You can drive through WV and not see coal mines unless you KNOW what you are looking for- the telltale access roads, the runoff and erosion, the weirdly filled-in sections of mountains. If you fly overhead or view from higher elevations, you can see the devastating scars that are caused by mountaintop coal removal. Recent stories of the flooding, environmental devistation, and toll on human life caused by these mines pale when you are down in the valley, and the mine is hidden one hill over.
Wind turbines are more in-your-face; it is more difficult to ignore the towers when you'll actually SEE them perched up there, spinning. However, rather than an entire mountaintop being obliterated- along with the forest, habitat, and damage to watershed, the wind farm will be a SINGLE thread of road following the contours of the land, with as little damage to the locan ecosystem as possible.
Threats to bat life are often cited as a main reason for opposing wind farms in WV, but I have to wonder how much bigger of an impact the outright removal of an entire forest habitat (as in this type of coal mining) has on their survival rate.
Bat kills from wind turbines or fish kills from runoff.
Maintenance jobs that will last until we develop fusion power vs. mining jobs that will last until the coal runs out.
CO2 vs. well, a slight humming noise.
Seems like wind power is a no-brainer for me, no matter how big the players are.
I'd rather see wind turbines than breath in more toxic fumes. But, now you can have both. The use of coal is on the rise because of the high price of natural gas. Support nuclear folks!! It's the best solution. All you see is just a large cooling tower, and it emits only water vapor.
Surprisingly, the acreage of forest loss is roughly the same between what is cleared to extract coal and what is removed to build an industrial wind energy facility - if you evaluate it based on their production of electricity (i.e., forest acreage lost on a per kilowatt-hour of electricity basis). About 4-5 acres of forest were cleared on average per wind turbine in recent industial wind energy projects built in Appalachia. However, the amount of coal extracted from beneath one acre of ground in a stripmine is vast - 10,000 or more tons. While a 1.5 MW wind turbine - like the ones installed in WV now - generates less than 4-million kWh's annually, a ton of coal can produce 2,000 kWh's of electricity. Consequently, the coal mined underneath 4-5 acres of a surface coal mine - if burned to make electricity - could match or exceed the lifetime (20 year) output of an industrial wind turbine. Therefore, wind turbines are giving birds and bats the old "double-whammy" due to habitat loss and causing direct mortality due to collision with these super-tall structions (thousands of industrial wind turbines are proposed for this part of Appalachia).
"Support nuclear folks!! It's the best solution. All you see is just a large cooling tower, and it emits only water vapor...."
... and radioactive waste that will be life threatening for the next 350 thousand years, not to mention the ruining of the landscape at te places where the uranium is mined, plus the poisonous mining waste