The political environment in Cape Vincent spirals downward toward complete chaos, as evinced by the most recent meeting of the Planning Board. A meeting whose agenda was dedicated to subdivision proposals was largely conscripted by the seemingly endless debate over wind-power development, and the bitter battle impinged on the lives and rights of people who were before the Planning Board with legitimate, nonwind-related business.
A similar but less dramatic situation exists in Hammond, and in Lyme, and has potential to erupt to some degree in Henderson. All of this is over proposals to erect wind farms, mostly by investors far from the north country. If everyone took a deep breath and looked toward the horizon and away from their own back yard for a moment, they might see something that makes their battling meaningless.
There are significant signs that a combination of the free-market system, a new Congress and a new state administration might put an end to the fight over wind farms because the policies and economic conditions that have allowed them to grow are all but gone.
The economic reality of wind-farm development has always relied on two things: government subsidies in some form, and a growing cost of electricity. In the middle of this decade, both federal and state governments were pushing financial aid to alternative energy projects, and because its technology is largely developed, wind power was a darling of the renewable energy crowd. Significant tax abatements promoted wind-power developments, direct subsidies made them even more attractive, and rising costs of natural gas (and pressure to retire coal-fired power plants) made higher energy costs more acceptable.
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