Health, safety, environmental protection, land value equity, tourism and business are important and valuable to this area! Get up to date facts at no-uplands.com, write your legislators, contact the Public Service Commission, attend meetings. The Public Service Commission seems to be our last chance to be heard, to stop this project until we get a thorough environmental impact review, setback changes, etc. so please contact them now with your concerns during their 60-day window for comment, urge them to do thorough studies, attend meetings. It feels like no one is listening!
Our family farm is on County Line Road, my roots are there, my family is there through generations. Their well-being is important, neighbors are important, the land and nature are important. My parents and grandparents saw neighbors as family and that is also being challenged.
Pattern Energy is a Canadian company owned by investors. They are here to reap the benefits for the investors. They are not our friends. They claim transparency, health and safety, to respect the land and our traditions and have true partnerships with the people according to their website. Statements on a website are useless unless they are followed with action.
Our state, county and township governments should at the very least insure the health and safety of landowners and neighbors. I see effort in some townships but not others and that saddens me. There were few answers from Pattern at a recent Iowa County meeting or from Senator Marklein at a separate meeting.
Requirements were eased on “merchant utilities” in the Wisconsin legislature over the years, they are not exempt from environmental review but are subject to a different review, a streamlined process which is far less compared to traditional public utilities creating an avoidable nightmare for rural communities.
The wind power here is not sufficient to use the same turbine size, thus the higher towers. Let’s not be their test run! This is too important!
The wind turbines at Montfort are approximately 215 feet. In perspective, the tallest building in Wisconsin is the US Bank Center in Milwaukee at 601 feet (42 stories). The proposed height of the towers in our area was 656 feet. (Proposed heights per Pattern would be between 550 and 650 feet at the last meeting I attended some time ago). Studies on the impact of the 48% taller and 297% more powerful wind towers being proposed for this area were sent to the Wisconsin legislature. The wind turbines proposed show households even miles from the nearest turbine will be exposed to documentable air pressure pulses that produce a wide range of negative health effects and according to more than one doctor will affect everyone with long term exposure. Exposure to closest landowners is even more troubling to me.
Med Flight will not fly into an area with wind turbines, having to land miles away, slowing response times in a dire emergency. Cell phone and internet service disruption is common while traveling through those areas. Most recent reports are of well contamination.
In a meeting I attended, Pattern Energy stated there are no healthrelated concerns and they take every precaution to meet setbacks. Setbacks are 1250 feet from a residence for the smaller towers or 1.1 times the height of the tower in some instances, yet their setbacks remain the same in our area for the larger towers. Things that affect an adult have far greater impact on our children, then factor in wildlife and farmer’s herds.
The base for each 215-foot turbine uses about 2 million pounds or 40 truckloads of concrete poured in two steps with a 15 to 20 foot depth and 60 foot width foundation depending on the size of the structure and the soil type. Imagine the concrete that will be hauled and poured for each tower to support the extra height. Our area has rock quarries, caves and mines making the ground more unstable and I would expect more susceptible to well contamination. The carbon footprint for each tower is massive, so how long does it take to overcome it with wind energy production? Add in the massive lines that will be needed to carry the power.
If you look at the landscape of people living here now that support our businesses, our townships and counties, many are moving from cities for the solitude of nature that this driftless area provides.
Who will be responsible for damages? Are our townships, counties or state willing?
Jo Hufnagel
Blanchardville