Neighbor News
Falmouth : Renewable Energy Taxes Going To Wind Turbine Litigation
Massachusetts Clean Energy Center picking and choosing how to fund wind turbine litigation. What are the rights of 351 cities and towns
On July 2, 2008, Governor Deval Patrick and House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi signed the Green Communities Act - Sal always had something up his sleeve ......
Former Massachusetts House speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi recently returned home to Boston after being granted early release from federal prison on an eight-year sentence for public corruption charges.
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Find out what's happening in Falmouthfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC), created by the Green Jobs Act of 2008, is dedicated to accelerating the success of clean energy technologies, companies and projects in the Commonwealth—while creating high-quality jobs and long-term economic growth for the people of Massachusetts.
But not all the people. Many have been lost as collateral damage in the all out war on fossil fuel. Commercial megawatt wind turbines installed in residential communities was the weapon of choice. A choice that has since taken the health and property rights with no compensation creating a second class group of Massachusetts citizens suffering under the blades of massive wind turbines
Find out what's happening in Falmouthfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Falmouth, Massachusetts is ground zero for poorly placed wind turbines in the United States.
The neighbors here and twenty one other communities describe the noise as torture from lack of sleep.
The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center in an April 2013 memo admitted acoustic noise mistakes were made by a company funded by the MassCEC .The tests were preliminary noise wind turbine noise studies. Maps in those studies done five years before the installation of any wind turbines in Falmouth showed the decibel noise levels on Black Smith Shop Road were above an intolerable 40 decibels. A special permit would be required to install the turbines in 2005.
The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center also known as the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative had purchased several foreign made Vestas V- 82 type 1.65 wind turbines they owned and could not sell at public auction. Vestas had recently bought out a company called Neg Micon who manufactured the NM- 82 type 1.65 wind turbine. These turbines are almost identical and generate up to 110 decibels of noise twice as loud as turbines used in the Falmouth preliminary noise tests in 2005.
The Town of Falmouth hid a noise warning letter for five years that the commercial megawatt Vestas ( Neg Micon) turbines generate 110 decibels of noise. The 110 decibels of noise is described as a hard rock band or chest pounding.
The Vestas V-82 turbine was installed with no special permit and the noise complaints started almost the day the turbine started to spin.
Since 2010 the Town of Falmouth has faced up to eleven lawsuits over noise, special permits, zoning all of which have to do with the health and property rights of up to 200 residential home owners.
The home owners face massive litigation costs to protect their health and property. These people are using their own resources and personal life savings to protect what they thought was the American Dream of home ownership. The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center is ignoring the litigation costs of those residents affected by the turbines.
Massachusetts has twenty one communities with poorly placed commercial wind turbines. In 2013 Nils Bolgen the wind turbine project manager at the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center changed setbacks to a single commercial wind turbine to 2000 feet. ( Falmouth has two town owned turbines )
The issue today is the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center in 2014 decided to subsidize the Town of Falmouth over its expenses over the wind turbines which includes litigation. The MassCEC is not funding any of the other 21 communities faced with litigation. The expenses as noted in their press release in 2014 point out the litigation fees as a burden on the Town of Falmouth.
The taxpayers and electric rate users of Massachusetts should not be compelled to pay renewable energy taxes so the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center can finance a legal defense of the Town of Falmouth against its own citizens.
State government, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, should not pick and choose how to fund litigation in any of the twenty one towns with poorly placed wind turbines.
The citizens of Massachusetts are paying taxes and paying massive legal expenses to protect their health and homes from a state wind turbine renewable energy agenda gone terribly wrong.
The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center is using tax dollars to help fund six years of litigation of town litigation in Falmouth while ignoring the expenses incurred by the victims of the wind turbines.
You can say the residents around the wind turbines are having their health and property taken with their own tax dollars. They are being shot with the bullets they paid for.
Quote from 2014 : Massachusetts Clean Energy Center
"voluntary reductions in operation due to unanticipated sound levels and related litigation."
Energy Officials Approve Relief Funding for Falmouth Community Wind Project:
"With this funding, MassCEC seeks to help the town recover costs associated with project curtailment. To date the town has incurred unexpected costs resulting from community concerns, voluntary reductions in operation due to unanticipated sound levels and related litigation."
