Vt. firm has plans for wind turbines
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Herrick Mountain in Ira is pictured from the rest area along Route 4. The road to the right is Ira-Birdseye Road. Albert J. marro / Rutland Herald |
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By Gordon Dritschilo Staff Writer - Published: March 27, 2009
A Charlotte-based company says on its Web site it wants to put wind turbines in Ira and several surrounding towns, but representatives of those towns say the company has not told them much about it.
The Web site of Vermont Community Wind declares the company intends to have a wind farm operating by the end of 2011. Officials in most of the involved towns, however, said they have not heard from the company.
"I haven't heard or seen from anybody," Ira Select Board Chairwoman Christine Tyminski said. "I'm a little befuddled."
Tyminski said she has heard rumors of such a project, and said the company might have mailed the town's small board something it had not gotten around to reading.
Calls to the office, home and cell phone of Vermont Community Wind President Per White-Hansen went unanswered Thursday.
The company's Web site also names Poultney, Tinmouth, Clarendon and Middletown Springs as potential locations, and more specifically lists Herrick Mountain and the Taconic ridges.
Poultney Town Manager Jonas Rosenthal said Thursday he had not heard anything about the proposal. Middletown Springs Town Clerk Laura Castle said she had only heard vague rumors.
Clarendon Select Board Chairman Michael Klopchin said his town was scheduled to meet with someone about a wind project April 3, but that he did not know who.
"They left a message with our administrative assistant and never made it clear who they were," he said. "We've been trying to get a hold of these folks."
A letter from White-Hansen to West Rutland Town Manager Mary Ann Goulette dated March 13 says the company has leased 4,000 acres in Ira, Clarendon and Poultney. The letter goes on to say the company is interested in leasing land West Rutland owns in Ira.
Goulette said she brought the letter to the Select Board on Monday and that the board has invited the company to a meeting in April.
Goulette said Vermont Community Wind is also looking at placing two towers in the vicinity of Clark Hill in West Rutland. She said she believes the project would total 60 wind turbines.
Tinmouth resident Marshall Squier said the town has no official word, either, and he would not even know about the plan if he had not stumbled onto the Web site.
"They're not letting anyone know what they're doing," he said. "People want to know what's going on and it doesn't need to be secretive."
Squier put the question of having the town look into wind power to the assembly at Tinmouth's unofficial town meeting last month, getting an overwhelmingly positive response. He said he hopes to organize a forum in the coming weeks where the communities can question the company.
"Not so much pro or con, but let's get some information out there," he said. "I'm not anti-windmill. If the community owns it, I wouldn't mind them."
A planned Rutland County wind farm went on hold in January, when Connecticut-based Noble Environmental Power closed its Rutland office. Company representatives said they had not abandoned the plan to build turbines near Grandpa's Knob, but that it was scaling back due to the economy.
White-Hansen was involved in a proposed wind farm in upstate New York, according to newspapers there. An account printed last week said the Beekmantown, N.Y., Town Council voted 3-2 to revoke a permit issued two years earlier, ending the project.
gordon.dritschilo@rutlandherald.com
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