Town forced to keep red flashing lights on decommissioned turbine when developer goes bankrupt
10/25/2019
I was wondering exactly how much it cost in electricity to run the systems in wind farming turbines especially those red flashing lights that draw power from the fossil fuel based grid.
My request for such information by sPower developer of the proposed wind farm of 175 turbines on 48 square miles was met with less than satisfactory response. I was merely told they have not selected the turbines yet.
In reading about a decommissioned site of merely ONE turbine in Massachussettes (a state where wacky climate nut Elizabeth Warren* is a US senator) it was stated in the article by Kathryn Gallerani that the township is being left holding the responsibility for making sure the electricity FROM THE GRID is continually supplied to this ONE turbine as it is decommissioned because the developer went bankrupt. They have set aside $10,000 for this bill.
Imagine that, subsidies and they still went bankrupt and now taxpayers are giving more money to fund these energy schemes after they are no longer working.
The article also stated, "Calter confirmed that KWI is essentially out of business, owing the town more than $600,000, after being an ongoing concern. It has been in operation since 2012 but has been a source of controversy with noise complaints and complaints about the flicker effect."
So eager to learn exactly what the dollar amount of their bill monthly I contacted the town of Kingston administrator Tom Calter directly to inquire on the cost they are paying for keeping the mandatory aviation warning lights blinking all night long. He graciously and expediciously replied with the figure stating it is $1,000 per month to keep the red lights flashing.
No where in the brocures by sPower or AES Corporation or any wind developer that I came across does it present this possible cost that a city or town or county or state or nation would have to absorb when these wind farms are decommissioned and a developer goes bankrupt.
In regards to all wind energy projects which really should all be banned and especially in reference to the Chevelon Butte wind farm project proposal of a whopping 175 turbines 745 feet tall each covering 48 square miles, I think this is important to know 3 things about this:
1) the cost of running red flashing lights and braking of these turbines drawing fossil fuel based energy when we are constantly sold these as being replacements for fossil fuels by politicians and sales groups and a ratio of the cost of energy drawn from the grid to what energy is produced plus sold at a profit
2) wind turbines are 100% dependent on the fossil fuel based grid drawing energy from it they are not just the fantasy image of free clean energy made by Mother Nature at no cost to us
3) if Chevelon Butte wind farm owners (would that be AES Corporation or sPower??) go bankrupt who will be responsible for keeping the lights flashing to the annoyance of hundreds of square miles all around and at what cost? Will it be 175 turbines x $1,000 per month = $175,000 per month??
Is the state going to make sure the companies involved set aside a bond to insure that the taxpayers and rate payers are not footing a $175,000 a month electric bill every month if this happens in Arizona?
* on Elizabeth Warren's website she wants to "Allocate $100 billion to solve the opioid and substance use crisis". This would cost every person in the USA of any age each $273.97 and as with most politician's promises especially that of Democrats like with Obamacare get to keep your doctor crap it's not likely to solve it and this continued referencing it a crisis is sales hype to "solve" what is more likely a drug addiction crisis. Calling it an opiod crisis is disengenuous sales pitch. She also does not state anything on her site that I could find about where her districts are, I wanted to know if she oversaw this failed lone wind turbine project that is costing Kingston $1,000 in energy costs every month. I guess her district is the entire state. If that is so then she is responsible for allowing this failure as she is a radical climate alarmist calling for an end to fossil fuels which is IMPOSSIBLE in our world unless we all go back to the middle ages. Govtrack.us states "From Jan 2013 to Oct 2019, Warren missed 147 of 2,091 roll call votes, which is 7.0%. This is much worse than the median of 1.5% among the lifetime records of senators currently serving. The chart below reports missed votes over time."
copyright 2019 Kenneth Wegorowski
feel free to reference this article with credit to myself and the town of Kingston Massachussettes administrator Tom Calter who graciously supplied data on how much the town is being forced to pay to keep the red lights on