Watermelons….Faux-green on the outside, Communist-red, on the Inside!

Cloak of Green The Links between Key Environmental Groups, Government and Big Business

This book was published in 1995 and after you read it you will never look at the Green Movement or your govt. the same way again. A massive con of the public by the Greens, govt. and the media. One world govt. is the end game for these groups. Follow the link at the bottom of the page to read the book online, get it at your library or order a copy, but read the book. Follow your tax dollars.

Now that Elizabeth May is in politics, and presumably hoping to attract progressive-minded people, she will have to live down her reputation, so caustically described by Elaine Dewar in her book, Cloak of Green, about the environmental movement, of being on all sides at the same time.

Dewar first ran into May when she (May) was a member of the Canadian government delegation to the preparatory meeting in Nairobi for the upcoming Rio summit on the environment. Since May was national director of the Sierra Club, as well as executive director of Cultural Survival Canada, Dewar found this rather puzzling. After a little further questioning Dewar came to the conclusion that May had become an NGO interface with government.Rogelio A. Maduro 21st Century Science and Technology : “Cloak of Green… is a devastating expose of the shady finances of the international environmental movement… if you’ve been snookered into supporting the groups that raise money to prevent environmental doomsdays, this book just might help save your money for real causes.”

Publishers Weekly : “Cloak of Green probed the dark underbrush of environmental politics…”

Joe Woodard BC Report : “This is a must-read for anyone interested in environmentalism and the “global environment” movement…this account of [the author’s] determined four-year journey through environmentalism is a triumph of truth over ideology.

Cloak of Green is truly honest reporting of a threatening future.”

Book Description
Most concerned citizens trust environmental groups to fight on behalf of the public for sensible solutions to the world’s most pressing problems. But Elaine Dewar discovered that this trust is often misplaced.

In this book the award-winning journalist explores links between key environmental groups, government and big business. Written like a mystery, Cloak of Green follows the author from a Toronto fundraiser for the Kayapo Indians of Brazil to the Amazon rainforest and the global backrooms of Brasilia, Washington and Geneva. Along the way she meets some fascinating people–Anita Roddick of the Body Shop, businessman-politican Maurice Strong, and activists who run key Canadian and American environmental groups. She discovers some disturbing revelations about these groups and their relations to “green” corporations and government.

Cloak of Green is a penetrating investigative study that challenges many established pieties of the environmental movement.

About the Author
ELAINE DEWAR is a prominent journalist and author with many National Magazine Awards to her credit.Cloak of Green can be read on line here

Bio-Blitz At Ostrander Point. Come out & volunteer. You may learn something!

Participate in PECFN’s BioBlitz at Ostrander Point, August 9-10, 2014

BioBlitz poster FINAL low colour-page-001

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Public invited to help inventory the biologically significant Ostrander Point.

Prince Edward County (July 30, 2014) – The Prince Edward County Field Naturalists are hosting the county’s first ever BioBlitz at Ostrander Point. The event runs over a 24 hour period from noon on Saturday August 9 to noon on Sunday August 10, 2014 and includes guided tours for the public focussing on how to identify a variety of species from plants to birds, insects and amphibians and reptiles.

Ostrander Point is located within the South Shore Important Bird Area, a site recognized globally for its importance to birds and biodiversity.

“Much of the biodiversity of the South Shore Important Bird Area has not been identified” notes Myrna Wood of the Prince Edward County Field Naturalists Club. Wood continues “Ostrander Point was the subject of an Environmental Review Tribunal hearing during which it became clear that we still have a lot to discover about the flora and fauna of the site. We hope this BioBlitz will help us uncover mysteries of who is living here as well as introduce the public to this unique site. Ostrander Point really is a gem that we have in the County, and it needs to be better understood.”

Wood and other naturalist experts [see list below] are aiming to identify as many species as possible at this unique site in a 24 hour period. The Ostrander Point BioBlitz is being held with the support of the Prince Edward Point Bird Observatory and Nature Canada.

For more information including a full schedule of events and directions to the site, members of the public are encouraged to visit http://www.saveostranderpoint.org .

– 30 –

Media Contacts
Myrna Wood, Prince Edward County Field Naturalists myrna@kos.net 613-476-1506
Cheryl Anderson, cherylanderson23@sympatico.ca 613-471-1096
Sheila Kuja, sanda.kuja@bell.net 613-399-3018

Confirmed experts / leaders:
Paul Catling (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, ERT expert witness) –alvar plants.
Ted Cheskey (Nature Canada, ERT expert witness) — insectivore birds.
Don Davis (ERT expert witness),  Myrna Wood (PECFN) – monarch butterflies.
Henri Goulet (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada) – insects and habitat.
Kurt Hennige (Kingston Field Naturalists ) – insects.
Megan McIntosh (Nature Canada) – purple martin roosting site search.
Tanya Pulfer (Ontario Nature Amphibian and Reptile Atlas ) – amphibians and reptiles.
Terry Sprague (Nature Stuff) – local birds..

Wind Action Meeting in Harriston, Aug. 16th. Hope to see you all there!

Saturday, August 16th, 2014, Meeting for Wind Warriors at the Royal Canadian Legion in Harriston:

 If you haven’t let me know that you are coming already, please let me know before meeting day so we can accommodate everyone comfortably.

 

Royal Canadian Legion in Harriston, 53 Elora St.  Phone is 519-338-2843.  Legion is almost next to the Ford dealership on the main Street of Harriston. There is parking behind the Legion and usually the front door is open but you can always get in through the back doors.

 

People are generally able to stay to talk to those newer to the issue who want more info, after the meeting.  In fact we often seem to have an informal meeting afterwards at the local restaurant while we have lunch and would love to see you join in!

 Please send any other agenda item you want to see up for discussion.

Agenda to date:

 

The only rule we have and hold to is that we DO NOT rehash frustrations with wind company or govt.  We do not rehash common knowledge re wind company and govt as per what might be discussed at a public info session. Meetings are held to discuss next steps and concrete plans for action. 

 

–  Ontario Regional Wind Turbine Working Group becoming Ontario Wind Action: 

There is keen interest in changing this meeting group currently known as Ontario Regional Wind Turbine Working Group into Ontario Wind Action, with development of a website to go along with the change in name and specific contact names for media use.  Regional group has always been about concrete action and next steps in the battle against industrial wind turbines.  This development has the potential to help build strength, inclusiveness and focus to the fight.  Bring your ideas for this one.  (FYI, below please see minutes of very first Regional/Actiongroup meeting from Dec. of 2010.  So many people have been hard at work ever since!)

 

– Paul Kuster will speak to the initiative he is using to sell seeding trees to plant as an alternative to ‘planting’ giant turbines in communities. A handout on turbines goes with the seedlings.  It’s a wonderful opportunity for your group to both educate and fundraise! 

 

–  Municipal elections are coming up quickly.  It’s important to discuss some strategies now, before election time is upon us. 

 

–  SWEAR will update on Julian Falconer legal work and upcoming Divisional court dates

 

–  Sherri Lange will present the possibility of launching succession demands and working to qualify for special powers under the Charter of Rights.  Possibilities include giving urban centers a wake-up call on why there is the major divide between urban and rural Ontario.

 

– Jaki of West Grey’s  http://howgreenisthis.org.  will give a brief lesson on using social media, ie ‘twitter’, facebook, etc. to further spread the message of STOP the Wind Turbines.

 

Please send any other agenda items you want to see up for discussion asap.  We will  leave some time for discussion on ‘Orange Zone’, MPAC and any items we would prefer not out in print in an email.  Merci!

____________________________________________________________________ 

For your interest, below please see minutes of the very first Regional meeting held in Maxwell in December of 2010. These were the days of wind industry open houses every week, townhall info sessions almost every week, a barrage of letters to the editor, protests, struggling to find a legal stand; anything and everything….

 

While moving the meeting place to Damascus and then to Harriston, Regional meetings continued to occur approximately 4 times a year, every year since then and continue to date. 

 

Renewable energy scam! Far Too Much Pain…..Far Too Little Gain!

Renewable energy is not working

Too much cost, not enough output or too little emissions reduction

My Times Column explores why renewable energy has been so disappointing.

On Saturday my train was diverted by engineering works near Doncaster. We trundled past some shiny new freight wagons decorated with a slogan: “Drax — powering tomorrow: carrying sustainable biomass for cost-effective renewable power”. Serendipitously, I was at that moment reading a reportby the chief scientist at the Department of Energy and Climate Change on the burning of wood in Yorkshire power stations such as Drax. And I was feeling vindicated.

A year ago I wrote in these pages that it made no sense for the consumer to subsidise the burning of American wood in place of coal, since wood produces more carbon dioxide for each kilowatt-hour of electricity. The forests being harvested would take four to ten decades to regrow, and this is the precise period over which we are supposed to expect dangerous global warming to emerge. It makes no sense to steal beetles’ lunch, transport it halfway round the world, burning diesel as you do so, and charge hard-pressed consumers double the price for the power it generates.

There was a howl of protest on the letters page from the chief executive of Drax power station, which burns a million tonnes of imported North American wood a year and plans to increase that to 7 million tonnes by 2016. But last week, Dr David MacKay’s report vindicated me. If the wood comes from whole trees, as much of it does, then the effect could be to increase carbon dioxide emissions, he finds, even compared with coal. And that’s allowing for the regrowth of forests.

Despite the best efforts of the Conservatives to rein in their Lib Dem colleagues, the renewable-energy bandwagon careers onward, costing ever more money and doing real environmental harm, while producing trivial quantities of energy and risking blackouts next winter. People keep telling me it’s no good being rude about all renewables: some must be better than others. Well, I’m still looking:

Tidal power remains a (literal) non-starter; if you ask ministers why nothing has been built, they say it’s not for want of proffering ludicrously generous subsidies on our behalf. Yet still no takers.

Wave power: again, the sky’s the limit for what the government will pay if you can figure out how to make dynamos and generators survive the buffeting of waves, corrosion of salt and encrustation of barnacles. Nothing doing.

Geothermal: perhaps great potential in the future for heating homes through district heating schemes, though expensive here compared with Iceland, but not much use for electricity. Air-source and ground-source heat pumps, all the rage a few years ago, have generally proved more costly and less effective than advertised, but they are getting better. Trivial contribution so far.

Solar power: one day soon it will make a big impact in sunny countries, and the price is falling fast, but generating for the grid in cloudy Britain where most power is needed on dark winter evenings will probably never make economic sense. Covering fields in Devon with solar panels today is just ecological and economic vandalism. Solar provides about a third of one per cent of world energy.

Offshore wind: Britain is the world leader, meaning we are the only ones foolish enough to pay the huge subsidies (treble the going rate for electricity) to lure foreign companies into tackling the challenge of erecting and maintaining 700ft metal towers in stormy seas. The good news is that the budget for subsidising offshore wind has almost run out. The bad news is that it is already costing us billions a year and ruining coastal views.

Onshore wind: one of the cheapest renewables but still twice as costly as gas or coal, it kills eagles and bats, harms tourism, divides communities and takes up lots of space. The money goes from the poor to the rich, and the carbon dioxide saving is tiny, because of the low density of wind and the need to back it up with diesel generators. These too now need subsidy because they cannot run at full capacity.

Hydro: cheap, reliable and predictable, providing 6 per cent of world energy, but with no possibility for significant expansion in Britain. The current vogue for in-stream generation in lowland streams in England will produce ridiculously little power while messing up the migration of fish.

Anaerobic digestion: a lucrative way of subsidising farmers (yet again) to grow perfectly good food for burning instead of eating. Contrary to myth, nearly all the energy comes from crops such as maize (once fermented into gas), not from food waste. Expensive.

Waste incineration: a great idea. Yet we are currently paying other countries to take it off our hands and burn it overseas. If instead we burned it at home, we would make cheap, reliable electricity. But Nimbys won’t let us.

Over the past ten years the world has invested more than $600 billion in wind power and $700 billion in solar power. Yet the total contribution those two technologies are now making to the world primary energy supply is still less than 2 per cent. Ouch.

If we had spent that sum on research, and steadily replaced coal with gas as a source of electricity, we would have done far more to cut carbon emissions and kept prices low. A new report by Charles Frank of the Brookings Institution has come to the startling conclusion that if you encourage gas to replace coal, you get fewer emissions per dollar spent than if you use wind or solar.

In Mr Frank’s words: “Solar and wind facilities suffer from a very high capacity cost per megawatt, very low capacity factors and low reliability, which result in low avoided emissions and low avoided energy cost per dollar invested.” In short, we are picking losers.

I would not suggest Drax goes back to burning only coal, partly because I have a vested interest in the coal industry and partly because more than 40 per cent of the coal we burn in this country comes from Russia, so we are more exposed to Vladimir Putin for our coal than for our gas. The answer is staring us in the face. Gas is the cheapest clean way of making electricity, and we are sitting on one of the world’s richest shale-gas fields. Yet investment in gas-fired power is deterred by the government’s preference for renewables.

Lefties Trying To Pretend That “Agenda 21” is a “Good Thing”! Maybe for them…..

Panic in “Sustainable City”

July 30th, 2014 by Tom DeWeese

The attacks came fast and furious, from March through June. A coordinated attack to vilify, ostracize and neutralize efforts by local citizen activists who are standing in opposition to Agenda 21 and its policy called Sustainable Development. The terms “conspiracy theory,” “extremists,” “fear mongers,” and “far right,” are all over these obvious attempts to smear any opposition to the agenda of the Sustainablist planners that now swarm over nearly every community in America.

It started with the American Planning Association (APA) delivering yet another report in a continuing effort to understand the fierce opposition to its “innocent,” “locally- driven” programs. Apparently it is a mystery to the APA why there would be  opposition to its plans to reorganize entire communities which sometimes result in turning people’s lives upside down.  The APA has done a series of studies over the past few years in an attempt to find a way to silence or counter our opposition to planning. The latest report, issued in March, 2014, entitled “The Actions of Discontent,” was perhaps the most honest of the reports the APA has issued, when it said the opposition to planning is “marked by deep philosophical differences between activists and planning proponents…”. That’s certainly better than saying we’re just nuts, unlike most of the usual attacks against us.

Case in point, the next attack came in April from the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), yet again. This makes at least four SPLC reports I’m aware of, to specifically focus on me as the ring leader of the opposition. This report, entitled “Agenda 21, The UN, Sustainability and Right-Wing Conspiracy Theory,” says “it’s time to call out the conspiracy theorists.” It demands that “politicians who spread falsehoods about Agenda 21 and its effects need to be shamed by other politicians, by editorial boards and other commentators and by the citizenry at large.” Those are pretty strong words. Apparently they are getting desperate to stop us.

That report was followed by another from the Natural Resources Defense Council entitled “Agenda 21 Conspiracy Theorists Threaten Cities’ Sustainability Efforts.” Next came another rant from “Treehugger.com,” calling me the “Conspiracy King.” Then came articles in two national news magazines, each relying on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s attack. Newsweek started it with a cover article entitled “The Plots to Destroy America.” Then came Fortune magazine and its smear of activist Rosa Koire, head of Democrats Against Agenda 21. Rosa told me that it started out as an interview, then, just to “even the playing field,” reporter David Morris decided to bring in ICLEI and the Southern Poverty Law Center. Yep. Two against one. That’s a little fairer odds than we usually get.

What we are witnessing is the panic of a collapsing tyranny which they thought was well in hand.  And for a couple of decades it was all going the Sustainablist’s way, until some of us started to expose their hidden truths. Watch and learn America. This is how tyrants react to anyone who dares to challenge them.  As is always the case, their tactic is a scorched earth policy to lash out in every direction with vicious force in hopes that something will stick.

In its complete exasperation, the SPLC demands that the business community, the Chamber of Commerce, local governments and the news media “needs to stop reporting on Agenda 21 as if it were a bona fide controversy and plainly state the facts about the plan.” Further, the SPLC demands that communities “need to be encouraged to return to or start to develop such plans in tandem with responsible groups like the American Planning Association.” In other words, just as in the climate change debate, the SPLC demands that there be no debate, no discussion – just shut up and do it!

Meanwhile the tyranny of sustainable policy builds in town and after town, neighborhood after neighborhood.

In the Western states, the EPA is on a tear to control water, making it impossible to run the ranches. The Interior Department is forcing reintroductions of wolves and Grizzlies at the peril of livestock, family pets, children and natural herds of elk and deer.

In Orem, Utah, Betty Perry was arrested, handcuffed, and put in a holding tank because the grass in her front yard was dying. Violation, said the zoning enforcement officer. More recently, as the drought rages in California, a couple has been threatened with fines of $500 because their grass in their yard was dead. The reason it was dead is because they were obeying a California state government mandate that told them to preserve water or face a $500 fine. Tyrants always want it both ways.

Julie Bass, in Oak Park, Michigan, wanted to plant an organic garden in her yard. She even asked the mayor and city council if it was OK to plant and they both answered yes. But as she went to work on it, she too was arrested by the local zoning enforcement officer and faced 90 days in jail.

In Naperville, IL, two women were arrested for trying to prevent the local power company from installing smart meters that they clearly stated they did not want. The police came to the aid of the installers, cut a lock off their fences and trespassed on their property as the women tried to prevent it.

In Montgomery County, Ohio, Jennie Granato’s home was rendered basically  worthless as the regional government enforced the installation of a bike highway across her front yard, bringing the lane within seven feet of her front door. To date she has not been compensated a red cent for the land they took as the regional government plays games with the legal system to deny Jennie her day in court.

Across the nation, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is swarming over producers of unprocessed milk, confiscating products and shutting down plants, arresting producers and buyers alike, even though there have been no reports of sickness or deaths. Not even a complaint. And the assault on small farms continued in Michigan where entire herds of a certain breed of pigs were destroyed, accused of being feral, even though farmers had raised them for decades.

In Fauquier County, VA, the Piedmont Environmental Council (PEC) has colluded with local county government to harass organic farmer Martha Boneta for hosting a children’s birthday party in her little farm store. The store was forced to close as she was threatened with fines of $5000 per day.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced last summer a decree to make American neighborhoods more “diverse.” It’s called “Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing,” calling for the federal government to gather and track data on “segregation” and “discrimination across America before deploying a wide range of social-engineering schemes to ensure more “diversity” in U.S. neighborhoods. It’s right out of the UN’s social justice plank.  Bottom line, if your neighborhood lacks the government mandated diversity breakdown, you won’t be able to sell your home to anyone but the racial quota they demand.

And on the international level, smug, arrogant, well-funded, white Sustainablists have determined that it’s a proper use of government power to ensure black residence of Africa continue to live in mud huts without electricity, clean water or an infrastructure to provide jobs. As Paul Driessen (author of Eco-Imperialism: Green Power – Black Death) reports, some 2.5 billion people still do not have electricity or get it only sporadically, and so must burn wood and dung for heating and cooking, which leads to wide-spread lung disease. No electricity means no refrigeration, safe water or decent hospitals. All of this is just fine with the perpetrators of Agenda 21 because such a life style, in their opinion, is sustainable! In reality it’s environmental racism.  And that is the real outcome of “social justice.”

All of these are examples of massive government overreach using the excuse of protecting the environment or controlling development or containing sprawl, or, in short, Sustainable Development. These, and many more outrageous government attacks on our once-free society, are the reasons why Americans are starting to show up at public meetings to demand that their elected officials protect them and their property from such out of control government sprawl. There is no justice, no reason, no compassion under sustainable policy dictates — just the rush to raw power for power’s sake.  Americans are feeling that reality first hand.

As a result, people are starting to listen to my warnings because they can clearly see the results. When they do feel that impact, and when they do ask questions, they are treated to stonewalling, lies and contempt by arrogant officials. So a growing number of Americans have stopped accepting their scare tactics and dire warnings of Environmental Armageddon. I’ve said for years that Agenda 21/Sustainable Development is built on a house of cards – on lies. And when such a foundation is finally challenged – it blows down rapidly. That is what is starting to happen across America. And that’s why the powerful Sustainablists are in such a panic over my efforts to expose these outrages.

Over the past three years pro-freedom activists have managed to convince more than 150 cities to end their memberships with ICLEI, one of the leading NGOs whose declared mission is to entrench sustainable policy into every community in the world.  A close associate of mine reported that the head of ICLEI USA told him they are scared because ICLEI can’t get new American cities to join them – because we made the very name “ICLEI” political poison. ICLEI is panicked.

More and more state legislatures are seriously considering anti-Agenda 21/pro-property rights legislation. Of course, Alabama has already passed such legislation, while  Oklahoma and Tennessee have passed similar attempts in at least one house of their legislatures. The Virginia legislature, after a two year battle waged by property rights activists, passed the Boneta bill to stop local harassment and over reach by local governments over small farmers. The legislation was a direct response by property owners to the enforcement of sustainable policy overreach. And it was a major defeat to the NGO’s pushing it. And it has them panicked!

Almost every day, now, I receive calls and emails from newly elected city councilmen and county commissioners from around the nation asking me what they can do to stop Agenda 21 policy in their community. I am starting to teach them new tactics to block new programs and ways to eliminate existing ones. We are especially focusing on strong language to define and defend private property rights. The fact is, Agenda 21 cannot be enforced without damaging property rights. Stand strong on that one issue and it can be stopped.

Regional governments and planning commissions are a major piece to the sustainable plans to change our government and impilment sustainable policies. With enough of these non-elected councils, sustainable policy can be enforced almost unopposed. The UN Commission on Global Governance defined the reason for the drive toward regionalism; “Regionalism must proceed globalism. We foresee a seamless system of governance from local communities, individual states, regional unions and up through to the United Nations itself.”

Forewarned is forearmed. So property rights activists are focusing on stopping the imposition of non-elected regional government councils that are now springing up across the nation. In just the state of Ohio, several local county and city governments have refused to join regional planning groups. Geauga County commissioners passed a resolution rejecting the Agenda 21 planning objectives put forth by the Northeast Ohio Sustainable Communities Consortium (NEOSCC). A month later the community of Lordstown, Ohio passed a similar resolution. The commissioners in Ohio’s Pickaway County refused to join the Central Ohio Regional Planning Commission. And of course, the outrageous destruction of Jennie Granato’s property for the sake of a bike lane exposed the near untouchable control yielded by the Miami Regional Planning Commission in Montgomery County, Ohio. The local property rights activists now understand the power they face.

Another reason for the Sustainablists to panic was the just-completed Climate Change conference sponsored by the Heartland Institute. This was a gathering of the so-called “skeptics,” the scientists and engineers who actually practice sound science in the pursuit of truth. They all have one thing in common from their research. They can’t find proof of the dire predictions of man-made Global Warming. These men and women of science have suffered greatly for their insistence on truth, no matter the cost. As a result, for years they have been black balled from science journals, denied funding for projects, and ridiculed for their opposition to the Climate Change hysteria. But they have persevered and they are beginning to turn the debate and the conference was full of a positive feeling of accomplishment. And right behind that conference, Australia became the first developed nation to repeal its Cap and Trade program, dumping the center piece of global sustainable policy.  And the Sustainablists are panicked!

And finally, there is this bit of news to turn any “Green” to a gray depression. Carroll County Commissioner Richard Rothschild (the man who led his governing body to be the first in the nation to send ICLEI packing) won his primary reelection bid with 58% of the vote.  Commissioner Rothschild was targeted in the Republican primary by a Democrat-turned-Republican just for the occasion. The labor unions threw all of their massive resources of manpower and money into the effort to make him an example of what will happen to officials who dare oppose them. Richard defied them, speaking clearly and precisely on the dangers of sustainable development and all the policies that go with it. He didn’t try to hide his conservative views. In fact, he put the word “conservative” along with the word “leadership,” on his yard signs. He told the truth. And he won. The battle isn’t over. He still has to win the November election. But he has proven that standing up and openly fighting sustainable development is a winning issue. And the Sustainablists are panicked!!!

To all the individuals and local activist groups who feel overwhelmed and hopeless in your fights – take heart. The Sustainablists are armed with billions of your tax dollars. They are powerful in the back rooms of your government. They have an open mike to any news outlet and they have had nearly a thirty year head start. But it is THEY who are now in a panic as their well-laid plans are starting to crumble under the weight of their own lies and arrogance and rotten policy. Obviously, for those smug, once-powerful NGO forces who thought they could crush their opposition with ridicule, there’s panic in Sustainable City!

The forces of freedom should gain energy from the NGO’s panic and increase our efforts to stamp out these self appointed tyrants once and for all. We certainly have a long way to go to restore our precious Republic. But it’s D-Day on Omaha Beach and, though we continue to face fierce fighting, we have established a beachhead and are moving inland.  And the Sustainablists are panicked.

As you face them in battle after battle, just remember these immortal words from Rocky Balboa; “It ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit…how much you can take and keep moving. That’s how winning is done!”   

– See more at: http://americanpolicy.org/2014/07/30/panic-in-sustainable-city/#sthash.58o1TTKq.dpuf

Too Many People Trying to Cover Up the Truth about our Climate!

PROFESSOR QUITS FIVETHIRTYEIGHT BLOG AFTER ANTI-GLOBAL WARMING ARTICLE BACKLASH

 
 

Environmental studies professor Roger Pielke, Jr. has quit Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight blog over a controversy that arose after he wrote a post denying that global warming is responsible for the increasing costs of recovery from natural disasters.

Pielke, a professor in the Environmental Studies Program and a Fellow of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES), reported to Discover Magazinethat over the last month he began to find that his work was being rejected by FiveThirtyEight. So, he told editor Mike Wilson that he quit.

The controversy grew after Pielke posted a March 19 story he entitled, “Disasters Cost More Than Ever–But Not Because of Climate Change.”

As soon as he posted the piece, the laymen critics in Silver’s audience began to attack him for daring to deviate from the idea that global warming causes all of the earth’s ills.

In his interview at Discovery, Pielke lamented the editorial cowardice of Nate Silver, who sat back and allowed Pielke’s critics to go so far as to organize an effort to have him fired at the blog, not to mention ultimately showing reluctance to support him by posting new pieces.

“I do wish that 538 had shown a bit more editorial backbone, but hey, it is his operation. If a widely published academic cannot publish on a subject which he has dozens of peer-reviewed papers and 1000s of citations to his work, what can he write on?” Pielke said.

The professor also said that he has a suspicion that Silver “knows very well where the evidence lies on this topic” but refused to fully support him over the whole thing for whatever reason.

Pielke also criticized the whole atmosphere at the blog, saying, “For me, if the price of playing in the DC-NYC data journalism world is self-censorship for fear of being unpopular, then it is clearly not a good fit for any academic policy scholar.”

Pielke was pilloried as a global warming denier–something he most decidedly is not–by such luminaries as Paul Krugman, Slate, and others after the original post went viral. Pielke said that he was shocked at how some of these people and outlets lied about him.

As he told Discovery, “It is remarkable to see people like Paul Krugman and John Holdren brazenly make completely false claims in public about my work and my views. That they make such false claims with apparently no consequences says something about the nature of debate surrounding climate.”

Pielke also noted that too often in the global warming debate people on the left side of the argument resort to name calling almost immediately: “There is a common strategy of delegitimization used in the climate debates. It seems that labeling someone a ‘denier’ offers a convenient excuse to avoid taking on arguments on their merits and to call for certain voices to be banished.”

But despite the attacks on him, Pielke says that the whole controversy probably hasn’t hurt his standing in the academic community too much.

“Ultimately, what I learned from the 538 episode is how small and insular the community of self-professed ‘climate hawks’ actually is,” Pielke insisted. “Sure they made a lot of noise online and got Jon Stewart’s attention. But that was because of Nate Silver’s fame, not mine. Back in the real world, outside the climate blogosphere and the NY-DC data journalism circle virtually no one knew or much cared about the 538 brouhaha, even within academia. I found that encouraging.”

Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston 

Windweasels Cause a Multitude of Horrific Problems….

Wind Power Sends German Power Market Into Chaos

Gaza_Blackout_Main_pic_1

With the introduction of unreliable and intermittent wind power comes the risk of widespread blackouts, social and economic chaos. However, to avoid the consequences, grid managers in Germany are paying conventional generators huge premiums to compensate for wind power “outages” – and the costs of doing so are starting to bite – not that the generators mind. Keeping chaos at bay has created opportunities to milk the system for what it’s worth – with some very handsome upside for savvy marketeers.

Here’s Bloomberg on the market debacle created by German wind power.

German Utilities Bail Out Electric Grid at Wind’s Mercy
Julia Mengewein
Bloomberg Businessweek
25 July 2014

Germany’s push toward renewable energy is causing so many drops and surges from wind and solar power that the government is paying more utilities than ever to help stabilize the country’s electricity grid.

Twenty power companies including Germany’s biggest utilities, EON SE and RWE AG, now get fees for pledging to add or cut electricity within seconds to keep the power system stable, double the number in September, according to data from the nation’s four grid operators. Utilities that sign up to the 800 million-euro ($1.1 billion) balancing market can be paid as much as 400 times wholesale electricity prices, the data show.

Germany’s drive to almost double power output from renewables by 2035 has seen one operator reporting five times as many potential disruptions as four years ago, raising the risk of blackouts in Europe’s biggest electricity market while pushing wholesale prices to a nine-year low. More utilities are joining the balancing market as weak prices have cut operating margins to 5 percent on average from 15 percent in 2004, with RWE reporting its first annual loss since 1949.

“At the beginning, this market counted for only a small portion of our earnings,” said Hartmuth Fenn, the head of intraday, market access and dispatch at Vattenfall AB, Sweden’s biggest utility. “Today, we earn 10 percent of our plant profits in the balancing market” in Germany, he said by phone from Hamburg July 22.

Price Plunge

In Germany’s daily and weekly balancing market auctions, winning bidders have been paid as much as 13,922 euros to set aside one megawatt depending on the time of day, grid data show. Participants stand ready to provide power or cut output in notice periods of 15 minutes, 5 minutes or 30 seconds, earning fees whether their services are needed or not.

German wholesale next-year electricity prices have plunged 60 percent since 2008 as green power, which has priority access to the grid, cut into the running hours of gas, coal and nuclear plants. The year-ahead contract traded at 35.71 euros a megawatt-hour as of 3:54 p.m. on the European Energy Exchange AG in Leipzig, Germany.

Lawmakers last month backed a revision of a the country’s clean-energy law to curb green subsidies and slow gains in consumer power prices that are the second-costliest in the European Union. Chancellor Angela Merkel’s energy switch from nuclear power aims to boost the share of renewables to at least 80 percent by 2050 from about 29 percent now.

Power Premium

Jochen Schwill and Hendrik Saemisch, both 33, set up Next Kraftwerke GmbH in 2009 to sell power from emergency generators in hospitals to the power grid. Today, the former University of Cologne researchers employ about 80 people and have 1,000 megawatts from biomass plants to gas units at their disposal, or the equivalent capacity of a German nuclear plant.

“That was really the core of our founding idea,” Schwill said by phone from Cologne July 21. “That the boost in renewable energy will make supply more intermittent and balancing power more lucrative in the long run.”

Thomas Pilgram, who has sold balancing power since 2012 as chief executive officer of Clean Energy Sourcing in Leipzig, Germany, expects the wave of new entrants to push down balancing market payments.

“New participants are flooding into the market now, which means that prices are coming under pressure,” Pilgram said. “Whoever comes first, gets a slice of the cake, the others don’t because prices have slumped.”

Increased Competition

German grid regulator Bundesnetzagentur welcomes the increase in balancing market participants.

“That’s in our interest as we want to encourage competition in this market,” Armasari Soetarto, a spokeswoman for the Bonn-based authority, said by phone July 18. “More supply means lower prices and that means lower costs for German end users.”

The average price for capacity available within five minutes has dropped to 1,109 euros a megawatt in the week starting July 14, from 1,690 euros in the second week of January, Next Kraftwerke data show. Payments for cutting output within 15 minutes dropped to 361 euros from 1,615 euros in January.

The number of participants has increased as the country’s four grid operators refined how capacity is allocated. In 2007, the grids started one common auction and shortened the bidding periods. Since 2011, power plant operators commit their 5-minute capacity on a weekly basis instead of a month before.
Bloomberg Business week

The same conditions that allow rorting and gaming of the power market in Germany exist in Australia: huge fluctuations in wind power output – with almost daily collapses – allows sharp operators to cash in, with grid managers entirely at their mercy. During wind power “outages” the dispatch price has rocketed from around $40 per MWh to the regulated cap of $12,500 per MWh – see our post: the Great Watt and Pole Swindle.

Wind power has provided Australian generators with the perfect “cover” for pricing tactics of the kind that helped Enron make a killing in the Californian power market during the late 1990s (see our post here.).

The end of the mandatory RET can’t come soon enough.

electricity-price-rise

Excellent Letter from the Waubra Foundation! Important information!!

Rye Park Wind Development, NSW. Letter to Minister for Planning from Waubra Foundation

Waubra Foundation letter to Hon Pru Goward, Minister for Planning, NSW Government. July 4, 2014
Dear Minister Goward,
 
I am writing directly to you to express the Foundation’s grave concern about the inevitable serious damage to human health, which will occur if the proposed Rye Park Wind Development is approved. Unlike the NSW Health Department, the Waubra Foundation has investigated these problems directly at NSW wind developments. The problems reported by NSW residents for over ten years are consistent with those being reported around the world. I have been working specifically in this area of low frequency noise and health full time for four years, and have given expert evidence in court proceedings in Canada and In Australia.
 
It is our opinion that previous advice given by the responsible officials from NSW Health to NSW Planning and NSW PAC members about wind turbine noise related adverse health effects (“no evidence of a problem”) is at best grossly ignorant, at worst willfully blind. We therefore urge you, as the NSW Government Minister ultimately responsible, to take heed of the warnings about serious harm to human health from wind turbine noise being increasingly expressed by researchers, medical practitioners, acousticians and scientists internationally, who have direct knowledge of the severity of the health problems, unlike theNSW Health Department who have refused to investigate for themselves.
 
I have attached a recent summary of the state of knowledge in this area, dated 1st June, 2014 together with a number of other documents which are of relevance, including a detailed critique of the latest 2014 NHMRC literature review, which details the material which was omitted from that literature review.
I have also attached some of the material sent to the Australian Medical Association from international researchers and clinicians who were extremely concerned at the ignorance and bias contained in the AMA’s recent position statement, and very concerned at the harm that would ensue if that advice was relied upon. Predictably wind developers including Epuron are publicizing that misleading AMA statement in order to mislead the public about the adverse health impacts which are very well known to the global wind industry (see http://www.epuron.com.au/wind-farms-health-australian-medical-association/ ).
The abovementioned material together with the large body of related research, and our direct knowledge of the problems being reported by residents living near wind developments in Australia and internationally provides the background context to the weight of our concerns about the impact of the Rye Park proposal on the immediate neighbours, out to at least 10km from where the wind turbines are located.
 
We have been advised there is a school in Rye Park, currently with 23 students and approximately 240 residents in Rye Park itself, but many more residents in the surrounding area out to 10km from the proposed wind development, which include part of the towns of Boorowa, Yass, Dalton as well as Rye Park.
 
We note that 10km is increasingly being acknowledged as the “acoustic impact zone” for large wind turbines, most recently by acoustic consultants working for a Thai wind developer, RATCH (see further details below).
 
We first mentioned the 10km distance in our Explicit Cautionary Notice, which we sent to the NSW Departments of Planning and Health in June 2011.
 
That Explicit Cautionary Notice and the reference to 10km was compiled because of the reports of characteristic symptoms and health problems from residents living out to that distance at wind developments in Australia, particularly the then only 3MW wind development (Waterloo in South Australia). Our concerns have only increased since then, with the evidence collected independently of the Waubra Foundation contained in the population noise impact surveys conducted at Cullerin in NSW, Macarthur in Western Victoria and Waterloo in South Australia, and the independent acoustic evidence collected independently of the Waubra Foundation which is confirming the presence and effects of wind turbine infrasound and low frequency noise out to that distance (see appendix 1 for details).
We note that Marshall Day Acoustics in their report for RATCH re the Mt Emerald wind development have recently referred to 10km in the context of cumulative impacts from other wind developments, and they are now specifically referencing infrasound and low frequency noise. In section 5.6 they stated in their section “review of cumulative impact” (my emphasis in red):
 
“Separate wind farm developments that are in close proximity to each other have the potential to impact on the same receiver. It is therefore necessary to assess any potential cumulative noise impact on receivers, where such circumstances exist. We understand that there are no other wind farm developments currently planned or operating within 10km of the proposed MEWF. On this basis, cumulative impacts of noise from more than one operating wind farm are not considered further.”
We note that Rye Park town itself is in a valley, and that the turbines will be on the ridges, which is known to increase the distance of sound propagation, especially with temperature inversions, common in this area.
 
Wind turbine sound is well known to travel along valleys. We note there are two other large wind developments proposed for the area (Bango Wind Development (122 turbines to the west of Rye Park) and Rugby Wind Development (52 turbines to the north of Rye Park) which increase our concerns about the cumulative adverse acoustic impact of all these projects, particularly on residents in the town of Rye Park.

Adverse Health effects from excessive noise known for many years

The significant adverse health consequences resulting from chronic exposure to excessive environmental noise resulting in chronic sleep disturbance and chronic stress and their serious downstream health consequences are detailed in numerous World Health Organisation major literature reviews on noise since 1995 (Community Noise 1995 and 1999, Night Noise Guidelines for Europe 2009, and Environmental Noise – Burden of Disease 2011 seehttp://waubrafoundation.org.au/information/acousticians-noise-regulators/literature-reviews/ ). They are also documented in a major Australian literature review on Environmental noise in 2004 (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/health-effects-environmental-noise-other-than-hearing-loss/ ). In other words, this issue of serious health problems being caused by excessive environmental noise is not new.
 
The longer the period of time the residents are exposed to excessive noise, the worse the cumulative effect will be on their health, and the greater proportion of the population who will be adversely impacted and report disturbance from the noise, because of progressive “sensitization” to the wind turbine noise (known and described in 1985 by Dr Neil Kelley et al http://waubrafoundation.org.au/2013/explicit-warning-notice/ and also documented by Professor Geoffrey Leventhall in 2003 http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/review-published-research-low-frequency-noise-leventhall/ ) and noted by UK ENT specialist Amir Farboud in 2013 (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/wind-turbine-syndrome-fact-or-fiction-farboud-et-al/ ).
Progressive worsening of the noise related sleep impacts with cumulative exposure on a given population is illustrated by the population noise impact surveys conducted in 2012 and 2013 by NSW resident Mrs Patina Schneider, on the Cullerin Range wind development, just outside of Goulburn (see appendix 1).
Your department officials and other public servants and ministers in the NSW government are well aware of the reported wind turbine noise related sleep and health problems at Cullerin, and other NSW wind developments, but have done nothing to improve the regulation of excessive noise from wind turbines which is harming the health of NSW citizens in predictable ways.

Breaches of Human Rights

Australia is a signatory to various UN Conventions and Covenants (see https://www.humanrights.gov.au/chart-related-rights-and-articles-human-rights-instruments-human-rights-your-fingertips-human-rights . There are two general areas where the human rights of rural residents living near wind turbines are being regularly breached, particularly because of the sleep deprivation they are experiencing. They are:
a) the right of citizens to attain the highest level of mental and physical health possible
b) the prohibition of torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.
Torture from sleep deprivation is a serious matter; as sleep deprivation and sensory bombardment from noise are acknowledged as methods of torture by bodies such as the UN Committee Against Torture (CAT), Physicians for Human Rights, and by the courts. Australia is a signatory to a number of UN conventions and covenants which prohibit the torture and cruel and inhuman degrading treatment of citizens, and for which responsible public officials may be held to be complicit or responsible if there is evidence of “intention”. See Part 1, Article 1, Section 1 of the UN Convention against Torture – bolding my emphasis (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/un-convention-against-torture/ )
 
“For the purposes of this Convention, the term “torture” means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person …… for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity.”
The longstanding attitude of neglect towards, or bias against rural residents badly impacted by environmental noise from wind turbines and other sources such as coal mining is blatantly discriminatory. Documented public statements by some NSW public service employees that rural residents are “collateral damage” (in the case of wind turbine noise) could be held to indicate “intent”, and a discriminatory attitude, when complaints of human rights abuses currently being prepared by some residents severely impacted by environmental noise are lodged with the Human Rights Commission.
Other UN conventions and covenants stipulate that the state will help individuals to attain the best possible physical and mental health (seehttps://www.humanrights.gov.au/chart-related-rights-and-articles-human-rights-instruments-human-rights-your-fingertips-human-rights ). This is impossible for rural residents to achieve if environmental noise pollution including wind turbine noise pollution is not properly regulated, independently of the noise polluter.
 
From a planning perspective, if wind turbines are sited too close to homes this will also result in predictable and serious harm to health. There is documented harm to sleep and health in residents living out to 10km from existing wind developments in NSW, Victoria and South Australia (appendix 1).
Wind turbine noise is being measured inside these homes, and increasingly acoustic events involving infrasound and low frequency noise are being shown to correlate directly with particular sensations perceived by the residents, which is consistent with the NASA & Kelley US research in the 1980’s (see particularly Professor Con Doolan’s work at Waterloo in South Australia http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/characterisation-noise-homes-affected-by-wind-turbine-noise/ as well as Mr Les Huson’s acoustic data collection at Macarthur in Western Victoria relating to “pressure bolt sensations” http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/huson-l-expert-evidence-at-vcat-cherry-tree-hearing/ and most recently Mr Steven Cooper’s acoustic survey work at Cape Bridgewater, commissioned by Pacific Hydro, currently being completed (preliminary details here: http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/trist-sonia-pacific-hydro-meeting-with-cape-bridgewater-residents-june-2–2014/ ).

Wind Turbine Infrasound and Low Frequency Noise Directly Cause Symptoms

The knowledge of direct causation of “annoyance” symptoms including sleep disturbance from impulsive wind turbine generated infrasound and low frequency noise is not new, but has been long ignored and denied by the wind industry, who are well aware of it. It is unfortunate that much of this crucially important research by credible research institutions was not included in the recent NHMRC literature review or draft information statement.
 
Researchers including NASA and Solar Energy Research Institute scientists led by Dr Neil Kelley in the USA established direct causation of “annoyance” symptoms from wind turbine noise in the 1980’s, which we have summarized in our Explicit Warning notice, also attached.
 
These research findings were consistent with previous scientific knowledge relating to military aircraft noise by Harvey Hubbard. Kelley also established a dose response relationship and recommended maximum exposure levels to help protect people from the adverse effects, which were based on his empirical data.
 
These exposure levels for chronic exposure to infrasound and low frequency noise were also ignored by the wind industry and its acoustic consultants, and no government wind turbine noise guidelines anywhere in the world has incorporated their measurement. This is hardly surprising given the very active role wind turbine manufacturers and developers have played in helping to write wind turbine noise guidelines – a gross financial conflict of interest which should never have happened.
 
The South Australian wind turbine noise pollution guidelines adopted by NSW were based on guidelines written in the UK called ETSU 97, which had a significant number of wind developer’s acousticians involved, and whose priority was the expansion of the British wind industry. Whilst acousticians have a professional obligation to protect the health and safety of the public above commercial considerations, it is clear that has not happened.
 
The NSW Department of Planning has also historically ignored the obvious financial conflict of interest which wind developers and wind turbine manufacturers have on this issue. Please look at the correspondence held in your department between Jonathon Upson of Infigen and responsible officers in the NSW Planning department, and Mr Ken McAlpine’s (VESTAS) submission to the NSW department of Planning concerning the proposed Wind Farm Planning Guidelines, with particular reference to their comments about infrasound and low frequency noise. Mr McAlpine’s comments were made at a time when the VESTAS CEO knew low frequency noise was harmful, but had lobbied the then Danish Environment Minister to ensure the proposed Danish low frequency noise guidelines were weakened in order to protect Danish jobs. (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/vestas-lobbies-danish-environment-minister-not-tighten-noise-regulations/ )
Further evidence that the wind industry are well aware of the direct causation of sleep deprivation and a range of other “annoyance” symptoms now known as “wind turbine syndrome” (WTS) includes the following:
 
• Non disclosure clauses or “gag clauses” in the following types of agreements with wind developers
o Property buy out agreements of affected residents (admitted by Slater & Gordon, May 2012) http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/slater-gordon-acknowledge-confidentiality-clauses/
o Wind turbine host contracts (documented by Coalition Senator Chris Back in the Federal Senate in October 2012 http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/senator-back-reveals-gag-clauses-wind-developer-contracts/
o So called “good neighbour agreements” which stop neighbours from complaining in the future about noise & health impacts. These have been particularly aggressively used by New Zealand developers Trustpower (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/neighbour-deed-palmer-wind-farm-south-australia/ ) and Meridian Energy, including in Western Australia.
• Encumbrances over neighbouring properties. See for example schedule 3 inserted in 2006 by Meridian Energy in a contract used in NZ.http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/meridian-energy-nz-forestry-group-memorandum-encumbrance/
 
• Confirmation by Professor Geoffrey Leventhall that he has known of the symptoms of “wind turbine syndrome” for years at the NHMRC workshop in June 2011, and in court proceedings in Canada. Professor Leventhall was one of two undisclosed peer reviewers of the first NHMRC literature review, who has worked with the wind industry for some years to protect its interests in various court proceedings internationally.
 
• The symptoms covered by the word “annoyance” were listed in the 2009 Literature Review commissioned by the American and Canadian Wind Industry in 2009 (the Colby Review) which was a key document relied upon by the NHMRC in its first literature review – the 2010 “Rapid Review”. Further details of what “annoyance” has been taken to mean are available here:
 
The inevitable results of this denial of the established science about the known adverse health impacts resulting from exposure to infrasound and low frequency noise, are the shattered lives and communities in places like Waterloo, South Australia and Macarthur in Western Victoria where VESTAS V 90 and V 112 wind turbines have destroyed the sleep, health and amenity of a growing number of local residents.
The experiences of these residents have been documented in senate inquiries, and in affidavits to legal proceedings in both Victoria and South Australia, and in no instance was the truth of the resident’s accounts questioned or disputed.

The importance of wind turbine separation distances

It is also of importance that these two wind developments using 3 MW turbines (Macarthur and Waterloo) as well as Cullerin Range in New South Wales (2 MWturbines), do not have the recommended turbine separation distances between them – they are far too close together, which inevitably increases the wake turbulence and the amount of infrasound and low frequency noise generated.
The NSW SEDA Wind Farm Planning Handbook from 2002 acknowledges the importance of adequate turbine separation distances (5 – 8 rotor diameters aparthttp://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/nsw-wind-energy-handbook-2002/ ) and yet the wind industry are pushing to have wind turbines sited much more closely together (eg 3 – 5 rotor diameter separation distances) at numerous wind developments across Australia (Cherry Tree in Victoria and Stony Gap in South Australia).
 
This is occuring despite longstanding research from NASA showing that increased generation of wind turbine infrasound and low frequency noise will result from upwind bladed wind turbines if the inflow air is turbulent (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/shepherd-k-hubbard-h-noise-radiation-characteristics-westinghouse-wwg-0600-wind-turbine-generator /).
 
A useful visual dynamic depiction of this turbulence, from the tip vortices, was recently captured by researchers at the University of Minnesota using laser lighting during a snow storm http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/university-minnesota-eolos-research-new-study-uses-blizzard-measure-wind-turbine-airflow/ .
 
At static depiction of the wake turbulence and the extent of the impacts (out to 20km) from Maritime wind development at Horns Rev in the Atlantic is illustrated below.
This increased generation of infrasound and low frequency noise is further exacerbated when larger wind turbines are used, because the sound energy generated from larger more powerful machines shifts down to the lower frequencies (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/moller-pedersen-low-frequency-noise-from-large-wind-turbines/ ).
 
Recent industry independent research from Johns Hopkins University has found that maximum energy generation efficiencies are obtained with turbine separation distances of 15 rotor diameters (http://www.windturbinesyndrome.com/2011/wind-farm-operators-are-going-to-have-to-space-turbines-farther-apart-johns-hopkins-univ-researcher/ .
 
Recent Adelaide University research published this year has confirmed that the tip vortices start breaking down at 7 rotor diameters distant from the turbine emitting them (https://www.wind-watch.org/documents/a-discussion-of-wind-turbine-interaction-and-stall-contributions-to-wind-farm-noise/ ).
 
It would therefore appear that a minimum of 7 rotor diameters should be used by wind developers as spacing between large wind turbines, in order to prevent the generation of excessive noise, including infrasound and low frequency noise, at least until further research is conducted to evaluate the human and acoustic impacts of using that separation distance. At the very least, in NSW, the 5 – 8 rotor diameter separation distances should be being adhered to, in accordance with the 2002 SEDA Handbook.
I have attached the Waubra Foundation’s submission to the Federal Renewable Energy Target review, which contains correspondence and data from independent acousticians Dr Malcolm Swinbanks and Mr Les Huson from the UK and Australia respectively which illustrates this point with respect to the Macarthur wind development in Victoria (see appendix http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/renewable-energy-target-review-waubra-foundation-submission-2014/ .

Concluding remarks

The serious adverse health effects including repetitive sleep deprivation and other symptoms euphemistically called “annoyance” have been known to the global wind industry and its acousticians for over thirty years (see http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/james-r-warning-signs-that-were-not-heard/ ).
UK Acoustician Professor Geoffrey Leventhall has publicly stated at the NHMRC workshop in Canberra in 2011 that the symptoms known to him as “annoyance” are identical to those described by Dr Nina Pierpont as “Wind Turbine Syndrome” (WTS). WTS is being acknowledged by increasing numbers of doctors and researchers globally, including most recently Dr Colette Bonner, the Irish Deputy Chief Medical Officer, and Dr Steven Rauch, a leading US otoneurologist from Harvard Medical School.
In addition to the sleep deprivation, annoyance symptoms and impaired quality of life which the recent 2014 NHMRC commissioned Systematic Literature Review identified, there is a disease complex known as “Vibroacoustic Disease”, (VAD) caused by chronic exposure to infrasound and low frequency noise and vibration, also described in the scientific literature for thirty years, which has more recently been identified in neighbours to wind turbines. The pathology associated withVAD is permanent, serious, and a growing public health problem because of the lack of noise pollution regulation of sound energy frequencies down in the infrasound and low frequency noise part of the sound spectra. VAD has been demonstrated in wind turbine neighbours in Portugal (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/alves-pereria-m-castelo-branco-n-ltr-australian-new-zealand-journal-public-health/ ) and reported by rural residents living near wind turbines in Germany (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/windwahn-story/ ).
 
Symptoms and disease complexes indicative of both WTS and VAD are being reported in an increasing number of rural Australian residents, together with exhaustion from sleep deprivation.
Sleep deprivation has been determined by courts to be an act of torture, or cruel and inhuman treatment because “sleep is considered a basic life necessity” (“Leave No Marks” http://physiciansforhumanrights.org/library/reports/leave-no-marks-report-2007.html ).
Sleep deprivation is well known to clinical medicine to be extremely damaging for mental and physical health, if it is prolonged. This is increasingly being demonstrated in the research literature, documented at length in the WHO guidelines for night time noise (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/who-night-noise-guidelines-for-europe/ ) and also since (http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/sleep-duration-predicts-cardiovascular-outcomes/ ,http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/munzel-t-et-al-cardiovascular-effects-environmental-noise-exposure/ ).
Regardless of any other symptoms and health problems particular susceptible individuals may develop with exposure to excessive infrasound and low frequency noise, the cumulative sleep deprivation and its well known consequences will be the inevitable consequence for many residents in the vicinity of the Rye Park wind development, if it is approved by the NSW Government.
 
If this wind development is approved, those responsible for approving it cannot say they were not warned of the predictable serious adverse health consequences.
 
Yours sincerely
 Sarah Laurie,
CEO Waubra Foundation
Attachments (downloadable at the following links)
Waubra Foundation: Recent Summary of Adverse Health Effects, 1st June, 2014
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/wind-turbine-noise-adverse-health-effects-june-2014/
Waubra Foundation: Open letter to NHMRC re flaws in 2014 Systematic Literature Review, 2014
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/waubra-foundation-open-letter-nhmrc-re-systematic-literature-review/
Waubra Foundation: Submission to the Australian Federal Government RET Review, 2014
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/renewable-energy-target-review-waubra-foundation-submission-2014/
Letter to AMA and recent literature review, Emeritus Professor Alun Evans, Epidemiologist, Ireland, 2014
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/evans-prof-emeritus-alun-dismiss-any-adverse-effects-absurd-view-mounting-evidence/
Letter to AMA from NZ scientist Dr Bruce Rapley, New Zealand. 2014
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/rapley-b-letter-ama-audibility-and-effects-infrasound/
Article by Professor Salt and Professor Lichtenhan in the Winter Edition of Acoustics Today, 2014
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/salt-n-lichtenhan-j-t-how-does-wind-turbine-noise-affect-people/
Physicians for Human Rights, “Leave No Marks” 2007 with particular reference to pp 22 – 26 relating to the use of sleep deprivation and sensory bombardment with noise as methods of torture
http://physiciansforhumanrights.org/library/reports/leave-no-marks-report-2007.html

Appendix 1 — Evidence for 10km acoustic impact zone from 2 – 3 MW turbines

Waubra Foundation’s Explicit Cautionary Notice, June 2011 first mentioned problems out to 10km
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/about/explicit-cautionary-notice/
Acoustic evidence of wind turbine noise extending out to 10km
NASA research from 1985 by William Willshire
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/nasa-long-range-down-wind-propagation-low-frequency-sound/
Professor Colin Hansen’s ongoing work relating to wind turbine noise out to 10km from Waterloo wind turbines is not yet published, however his opinion based on acoustic evidence was included in his letter to the Victorian Department of Health, regarding false and misleading statements about infrasound in their technical document issued in 2013
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/prof-colin-hansen-writes-victorian-dept-health-recent-wind-farms-health-doc/
Steven Cooper’s acoustic data from Waterloo wind development (8km)
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/are-wind-farms-too-close-communities/
Mr Les Huson’s expert evidence from the Cherry Tree case, relating to Macarthur, where he found that there was no attenuation of infrasound between 1.8km and 6.4 km from the nearest wind turbines, indicating that wind turbine generated infrasound will be travelling for very large distances (much greater than 10km)
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/huson-l-expert-evidence-at-vcat-cherry-tree-hearing/
The various population noise impact surveys done in Australia are here:
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/library/community-noise-impact-surveys/
Waterloo, South Australia – VESTAS V 90 (37 along a ridge)
Mrs Mary Morris’s 2012 survey conducted at Waterloo in South Australia. This survey was the only Australian research included in the 2014 NHMRC Systematic Literature Review
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/waterloo-wind-farm-survey-2012/
This 2012 survey by Mrs Morris was based on one conducted in 2011 by Frank Wang, an Adelaide University Masters student, but the population surveyed in Wang’s survey was only out to 5km
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/evaluation-wind-farm-noise-policies-south-australia/
Mrs Morris then compiled this information in 2013 showing what happened when the turbines at Waterloo were off for a week http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/morris-m-waterloo-case-series-preliminary-report/
Cullerin Range, NSW, 2 MW Repower turbines, sited on a ridge
Mrs Schneider’s 2012 and 2013 population noise impact surveys show the extent of the sleep deprivation. Nothing has been done about the severe night time noise related sleep disturbance and adverse health impact for these NSW residents by any NSW government department, despite many complaints which are documented in the 2013 survey.
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/cullerin-range-wind-farm-survey-august-2012/
Macarthur Wind Development, 140 3 MW V 112 VESTAS wind turbines, sited on flat land in Victoria
This survey was conducted only 6 months since the wind development commenced operating. Residents report being far more adversely impacted now, because of the predictable and known adverse cumulative health effects of chronic sleep deprivation and chronic stress.
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/macarthur-wind-energy-facility-preliminary-survey/
Evidence from Macarthur Wind Development Residents and acoustician Mr Les Huson was heard during the Cherry Tree Court case before the Victorian Civil Administrative Appeal Tribunal in 2013. Links to affidavits from Macarthur residents relating to that court case are below:
Mrs Maria Linke (lives 5km away, with her husband and four children – sleep adverse affected immediately)
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/linke-m-witness-statement-vcat-cherry-tree-hearing/
Mrs Jan Hetherington, widow, glass artist, working from her home 3km away from nearest wind turbine
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/hetherington-j-witness-statement-vcat-cherry-tree-tribunal/
Mr Andrew Gardner, Farmer, home is 1.8km away from nearest wind turbine
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/resources/gardner-statement-vcat-cherry-tree-hearing/ (1.8km away)

Posted on: 25 July 2014. Category: , . Tags: , , , ,, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , .

Will the Republicans Hold Obama Accountable for Presidential Overreach?

 

House Republicans authorize lawsuit against Obama for presidential overreach.

 

President Barack Obama speaks about the economy, Wednesday, July 30, 2014, at the Uptown Theater in Kansas City, Mo. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

House Republicans voted Wednesday evening to authorize an unprecedented lawsuit against President Obama, escalating a separation of powers battle between Congress and the White Housethat is heavily tinged with election-year politics.

Mr. Obama mocked Republicans, telling them to “stop just hatin’ all the time,” but GOP lawmakers said they felt boxed in, being unable to get their legislation through the Democrat-controlled Senate and having to watch as the president tweaks, waives or ignores laws Congress has written but which he dislikes.


SEE ALSO: HURT: Impeaching Obama is a losing strategy for the GOP


“This isn’t about Republicans and Democrats; it’s about defending the Constitution that we swore an oath to uphold and acting decisively when it might be compromised,” said House Speaker John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican, as he pleaded for Democrats to look beyond their party allegiance and defend Congress against an ever more powerful chief executive. “Are you willing to let any president choose what laws to execute and what laws to change?”

The 225-201 vote, which broke down almost entirely along party lines, was a resounding rejection of Mr. Boehner’s call, as Democrats said Republicans were more interested in repealing Obamacare and stopping the president’s agenda.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California, the chamber’s top Democrat, said she could see no reason for the Republican effort unless it’s a precursor for impeachment.

“Why would you sue somebody unless you want to prove something? And why would you go down that path unless you wanted to do something about it?” Mrs. Pelosi said. “Middle-class families don’t have time for the Republican partisan grudge match with the president.”

Mr. Boehner a day earlier said there were no plans to pursue impeachment and that Democrats are the only ones talking about impeachment because it’s a successful fundraising tactic for them.

Mrs. Pelosi, though, said Mr. Boehner must officially rule impeachment “off the table” — a phrase she used when she squelched efforts by her fellow Democrats to impeach President George W. Bush.


SEE ALSO: Obama to Republicans: ‘Stop just hatin’ all the time’


The details of the lawsuit itself were almost an afterthought, but under the resolution passed Wednesday, House attorneys can be directed to file suit challenging Mr. Obama’s decision to issue waivers of his own health care law’s “employer mandate,” which was supposed to require large companies to provide insurance for their employees or else face fines.

Mr. Obama waived the fines for 2014, then expanded his waiver to include 2015 and 2016.

Mr. Boehner said House Republicans support waiving those fines, which is why it’s all the more strange that Mr. Obama acted alone, without coming to Congress to change the law. He said that situation is why Republicans chose to sue over Obamacare rather than a host of other perceived overreaches including those involving environmental and immigration policies.

The lawsuit’s chances for success are questionable.

Legal analysts said the biggest hurdle will be overcoming the federal courts’ rules requiring a plaintiff to show harm before the judges will hear the case. Institutional harm to Congress‘ constitutional powers generally has been rejected as a sufficient reason.

But some analysts said it’s an open question for the Supreme Court — and they argue Mr. Obama’s overreach has been so dramatic that judges might be tempted to get involved in order to rebalance the two other branches of government.

Speaking in Kansas City, Missouri, hours before the vote, Mr. Obama taunted Republicans, asking them to forgo the lawsuit and instead back his agenda of raising the minimum wage, boosting spending on infrastructure and other steps he said would help the middle class.

“Come on and help out a little bit. Stop being mad all the time. Stop just hatin’ all the time,” the president told a raucous crowd. “Come on. Let’s get some work done together.”

Minutes after Wednesday’s vote, the White House sent out an email to supporters vowing to take more executive action — this time issuing a policy laying out stiffer worker safety rules for federal contractors.

White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer also said in the email that Mr. Obama will “deal with our broken immigration system in the months ahead.”

Mr. Obama, who had some legislative successes in his first two years in office, backed by huge majorities in both the House and Senate, has grown increasingly frustrated since 2011, when Republicans took control of the House and began trying to roll back his policies.

With Democrats still controlling the Senate, that’s often led to gridlock on Capitol Hill — and Mr. Obama has enthusiastically claimed the right to take action on his own when Congress won’t.

Judges have taken a dim view of some of those actions. Last month a unanimous Supreme Court ruled that he overstepped when he made recess appointments to four key positions at a time when the Senate was meeting every three days in pro forma sessions specifically to deny him his recess powers.

Mr. Obama had argued that the Senate wasn’t really in session, but all nine justices rejected that, saying it’s up to Congress to decide those matters.

All Democrats who voted Wednesday opposed the lawsuit, as did five Republicans: Reps. Paul C. Broun of Georgia, Scott Garrett of New Jersey, Walter B. Jones of North Carolina, Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Steve Stockman of Texas.

“This lawsuit is merely an act of political theater that is highly unlikely to result in any real consequences for an executive branch that continues to display a blatant disregard for the rule of law,” Mr. Jones said in a statement.

He said rather than sue, the House should either impeach Mr. Obama or use its power of the purse to cancel Mr. Obama’s actions.

Both sides are expected to use Wednesday’s vote as they gin up their base ahead of November’s elections.

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Some Sanity Returning?… Wind Turbine Setbacks May Halt Plans!

Monday, July 28th, 2014
By Kathy Thompson
Wind farm could be knocked flat by new regs
 
  Stricter setback regulations approved in June could foil proposed plans for a wind turbine project that stretches into northern Mercer County.
Gov. John Kasich signed House Bill 483 in June, which includes a revision requiring wind turbines to be erected 1,300 feet from the nearest property line. The law previously required turbines to be placed 1,300 feet from a structure and about 550 feet from a neighboring property line.
The proposed Long Prairie wind farm project involves about 300 landowners – 17 in Mercer County – who earlier leased property to BP America for the construction of 67 300-megawatt turbines. BP in May sold its 16 operating wind farms in nine states and its portfolio of planned projects to Apex Clean Energy Inc.
Apex president Mark Goodwin called HB 483 an “Ohio job killer.” As it stands, the legislation would eliminate about $114 million in local spending, $15 million in lease payments to local landowners, $45 million in local tax revenue and $22.5 million in new payroll income for the area during the next 20 to 25 years, he said.
Goodwin sent a letter to Kasich soon after the legislation was signed, stating his company has “more wind energy development projects in the state than any other company” and claimed the bill would eliminate more than $3 billion in wind project investments.
Goodwin claims Apex may be forced to take its investment elsewhere. He is hoping the bill will be amended and his company can move ahead with the project.
“We have invested about $10 million in these projects, and we have tens of thousands of acres of private land leased with local landowners,” Goodwin stated. “The setbacks will make it impossible for us to build these projects at all.”
Rob Nichols, a spokesman for Kasich’s office, said the setbacks were created to protect property value and human health.
“Every industry has rules and provisions,” he said. “This office sees this industry as no different than any other.”
Despite the setback issue, the company remains optimistic.
“We’re very excited at this new prospect,” said Scott Koziar, director of project development for Apex. “Clean energy is wanted in the nation. We know the transition has been a bit slow, but the project is one of several that we’ve acquired and we want to be open and transparent.”
Koziar said the company is still in the process of contacting landowners and government officials about the buyout, but hope in the coming weeks to meet with commissioners in both counties and have formal conversations with landowners in the spring.
“We’re at the very beginning of this,” Koziar said. “Before we do a deep dive with owners and commissioners, we need to see what our next steps are, make sure we have all our environmental studies completed, look at the taxes schools would get, and what road and maintenance commitments we will be making.”
Koziar said if the project kicks off this year or next, it could be completed by 2017 or 2018.
One of the landowners leasing property to Apex said he isn’t happy about the new setback regulations.
“Good Lord,” said Jerry Rolsten of Mendon, who has a contract to lease 186 acres of land to Apex. “That’s a lot. I may not even be eligible if that’s true. If I am, it’s going to be real close. This could get interesting.”
Rolsten said he “believes in progress” and that is why he decided to lease his land for the development of a wind farm.
Koziar said the proposed local wind farm would create 200 to 300 construction jobs and 15 to 18 long-term jobs. The wind turbines would generate electricity for 40,000 homes, he added.
“That’s actual energy consumed within the area,” Koziar said.  
Opponents claim the “flickers” or shadows cast by the blades, as well as the turbines’ loud noise are annoying. They also note their presence decreases property values.
Van Wert resident Milo Shaffner, 67, said he hopes the proposed venture is abandoned. He lives about a mile from the operational Blue Creek wind project and farms within 600 feet of turbines.
“They are very unsightly to begin with,” he said. “The sound they make is so disturbing, it sounds like a jet plane going overhead. My wife and I can’t sit on our front porch and drink coffee in the mornings anymore.”
Shaffner said his quality of life has “gone down the drain” since the turbines arrived.
“We used to have a great landscape to look at,” he said. “Our roads are ruined, my neighbors have health issues. Those turbines are industry and this is supposed to be farm country. They don’t belong here.”