First it was "Who has seen the wind", now it's "Who owns the wind"?

 
 


                                       The Orangeville Citizen (Oct.18, 2007) wrote about the wind turbine hearings held in Amaranth for the upcoming Melancthon II wind farm project, located west of Shelburne, Ont. Some interesting comments from the attendees were reported: "Mr. Lever says there are health issues within two miles of the turbines" wrote the paper, but no details of these claims were given. "His assertions are not within the purview of the OMB."
New towers are to be located at least 450 metres from existing homes on non-participating lands, but new homes could be constructed as close to a turbine as owners wished. Resident Earl Cowan "raised the issue of landowners reaping the harvest from wind that came from across adjoining properties. "What if I were to build a wall 120 metres high?" (to block the wind from the turbine on adjacent property)."
[...add three more walls while you're at it, and you'll have a hi-rise condo..!]

Township lawyer Jeff Wilker, the paper wrote, "said the question goes to the point of "who owns the wind. It's a developing area of law. There's not a lot of jurisprudence," he said."

Yikes... lawyers are getting involved in regulating the wind! First it was W.O. Mitchell's classic "Who has seen the wind", now it's "who owns the wind", next thing you know they'll be suing those who passed wind. Look out, windbag Al Gore might soon be handing out tickets and fines to farters!

It would be interesting to know what the specific health issues are from wind-power electrical generation. These photos (click picture to enlarge) taken Oct. 2007 show the current Melancthon project as it appears from the roadside. One of the cattle I saw had a huge growth on its right rear leg, but that's probably unrelated. Turbines can be seen several miles away as you approach the project, and there are pockets of towers scattered through out farm fields. It actually was fairly windy the day I visited, and the blades were all spinning . I didn't know what to expect, but they were not 'noisy'; the wind blowing through the fields was noisier. On some of the massive towers that were closer to the road, you could hear a little bit of a steady hum, which might have been from the blades. There is a large infrastructure already built in the form of a several-mile-long feeder-line running south to connect to the main hydro grid, along which future wind farms are sure to follow. A wind farm is also being built in Niagara, in the Wainfleet area near Lake Erie.
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