To the editor:
I am so disappointed to learn that the Antrim Wind project is threatened again. I hope the people of Antrim who support the project will speak up once more.
After fighting the NED pipeline project, I truly empathize with those who object to having their lives disrupted by energy projects. However, my reason for fighting the NED pipeline was based on the harms caused by abandoning fuel diversity and the climate change impacts of nearly doubling the flow of natural gas into New England. I see wind power as something majestic and beautiful.
Have you ever been to the Mountain View Grand Hotel in Whitefield? They have a 121-foot wind turbine right behind the hotel. U.S. News & World Report just ranked them the #1 Best Hotel in New Hampshire for 2017. In March of this year, I spent a weekend skiing at the Berkshire East Ski Resort. Berkshire East meets 100 percent of its electricity needs with ½ megawatt of solar panels and a 1 megawatt, 277-foot wind turbine. Nearby in Hancock, Massachusetts, is the 10-turbine 15-magawatt Berkshire Wind Power Project, producing enough electricity to power 6,000 homes. Sitting atop Brodie Mountain, the wind turbines proclaim the beginning of a clean energy future in which we no longer fight wars over oil or poison our world and our children with fossil fuel pollution.
Certainly, wind projects have to be properly sited. Sometimes it’s difficult to tell if the objections to a particular project are fair or have been overblown by organized anti-wind groups. I have concern that the same lobbyists who killed the Cape Wind project are operating in New Hampshire (Marc Brown, New England Ratepayers Association is one) on behalf of fossil fuel interests.
I hope that Antrim will become another beacon for a clean energy future. If you support the project, please speak up.
Patricia Martin
Rindge