Back in January, I wrote about wind farming in my weekly Laconia Daily Sun column–The January 9th NH Union Leader contained an interesting story about a man constructing a wind-generating farm on Mt. Jerico in Berlin. With the help of his father, Massachusetts transplant and entrepreneur Christain Loranger has been working since the summer building three windmills that will conceivably produce enough clean electricity to power nearly 700 homes. The article reports Berlin’s mayor, Bob Danderson
“is enthusiastic about the project, saying it will help diversify the city’s mill-based economy.”
Sounds pretty good, right? Living in an era of rapidly escalating fuel and energy costs, what could be wrong with generating power with wind? No CO2 emissions. No spill hazards. What a concept! Not so fast- the Union Leader article reports that not everyone is thrilled with the concept of harnessing wind to make electricity.
“Some environmentalists are fighting the larger wind projects. They say 300- to 400-foot towers are too big, noisy, and destructive to birds and bats, which can be killed by the spinning blades.” The piece concludes: “Lisa Linowes of National Wind Watch says a project on the scale of Loranger’s isn’t nearly as bad as some. But if it succeeds, she predicts big companies will try to move in to capitalize on the resource. ‘What we will do is invite big wind into Berlin,’ she predicted.”