The cost of energy

NY Times:

Wes Maupin says he will move this spring to a 20-acre spread here in remote Highland County, a pastoral place where sheep outnumber people and where little has changed since his boyhood, when he fished the county’s mountain streams with his father.

Mr. Maupin, a 52-year-old former corrections worker, does have one misgiving, though. Like many others in Highland, known for its rustic heights as Virginia’s Switzerland, he finds no joy in the prospect that these blustery Allegheny ridges could soon become home to the state’s first wind farm: 19 wind turbines, each taller than the Statue of Liberty, its pedestal included.

“Any wind farm,” Mr. Maupin said, “would surely change the character of this county forever.”

Much as disputes over the aesthetics, economics and environmental impact of wind farms have arisen in Vermont, Massachusetts, North Carolina and elsewhere, the proposed project here, first put forth eight years ago, has divided the 2,500 residents of Highland County, one of the least populated counties east of the Mississippi. Where some see unwelcome industrialization of the wilderness, others see green energy and an estimated $200,000 a year in tax revenue for the financially needy county.

Though the farm would sit on only 50 acres of the county’s 416 square miles, many fear it would be just the vanguard of similar local projects providing electricity for the regional grid.

“People around the state feel Highland should be sacrificed because not too many people live here,” said Sandy Bratton, 64, a fourth-generation landowner. “They view us as docile, uneducated people.”

But at Grady’s Barber Shop here in Monterey, the county seat, 35 miles west of Staunton, Roy Waggoner said he supported the $60 million project.

“One way to clean up the environment is with the wind turbines; it’s green energy,” said Mr. Waggoner, 57, a sheep rancher. “I don’t want to see them on every inch of land, but that ridge is very secluded.”

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The selfish not in my backyard crowd seems to want a free ride on energy. No nukes, no coal plants, no wind farms, maybe a natural gas plant, that si about it, and these same people will complain about the high cost of electricity. Let's see how much electricity they can generate by conserving.