Residents Weigh In On NYPA Offshore Wind Project

MAYVILLE - Chautauqua County is at a Dickensian crossroads, according to Doug Champ.

As chairman of the annual Chautauqua County Energy Conference, Champ sees opportunity in developing offshore wind power locally.

During the County Legislature's April 28 meeting, Champ asked lawmakers to consider the future - using the phrase "a tale of two counties."

Champ wants local officials to be fully educated the potential for a local wind power project. The opportunity, he said, is one which can create jobs and development in the county as well as address the nation's energy issues.

The New York Power Authority has identified Lake Erie and Lake Ontario as possible sites for turbines and is expected to name a developer for its Great Lakes Offshore Wind Project in early 2011.

"Offshore wind is coming," Champ said. "If we choose to ignore it and its potential, it will shift somewhere else."

In asking legislators to support the development of wind technology locally, Champ mentioned both the recent coal mine accident in West Virginia and the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

"The impact of those have yet to be found," Champ said. "Undoubtedly they will have tremendous impacts on the environment and they will continue to be a problem associated with fossil fuels."

Champ said he stands willing to educate legislators and the public about the alternative energy source, possibly chairing a committee on the subject.

"I believe this county can step forward and compose itself a plan," Champ said. "If we do not step forward with this kind of promotion for this county to utilize all its resources, we will be a tale of two counties - the one with and the one without. I suggest that you think about its future. Utilize the potential alternative energy and job creation and development that exists."

Champ's comments were followed immediately by an opposing viewpoint, given by Tom Marks, New York Director of the Great Lakes Sport Fishing Counsel.

Critical of industrial-sized wind turbines, Marks said the machines are not green and alleged that developers cannot promise delivery of their product.

"They have to be backed up by coal, nuclear, hydro or some other dependable source of energy," Marks said. "Wind is green, but on a smaller scale - if you put it on a house or a building. ... We can have wind energy, but not on the industrial scale."

Marks went on to criticize putting turbines in the Great Lakes and claimed that such turbines will cause property values to drop.

"The Great Lakes is not a place to put wind turbines," Marks said. "These are national treasures. They don't need to be disgraced with wind turbines. Our sunsets, our view - there is an economic and environmental value to that. It encourages tourism. It will represent a tremendous loss of property value and this can be argued and challenged all you want, but believe me, when people have a view of an industrial site behind their house, the value is going to decline. The rest of us in the county will have to pick up that tab because the assessments will drop, so it's going to cost everybody in the county money."

Marks questioned how turbines will benefit local residents, claiming that the state will be the real beneficiary. Additionally, he claimed that the developers hired will likely be foreign companies already familiar with the technology.

"We can't let businesses come in here from overseas with no risk at all, taking our tax dollars to erect these structures," Marks said. "Once the incentives are finished, 10 to 15 years down the road, these businesses won't be able to stand on their own and they'll collapse. What will we do then with those wind turbines out in the lake? We'll foot the bill either to keep them running or tear them down. If they're not profitable, we'll end up tearing them down."

Later in the meeting, the legislature approved a motion opposing such projects.

The motion was initially sponsored by Dunkirk Democrats Shaun Heenan and Keith Ahlstrom as well as George Borrello, R-Irving.

The motion opposes the New York Power Authority developing wind-generating projects in the New York waters of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario. The three legislators are calling on local, state and federal elected officials to question NYPA on its proposal.