Dear editor,

I would like to take this opportunity to express my opinion on the issue of wind farms, not only in Dufferin County, but as it affects the entire province of Ontario.

Wind energy is a farce.  Wind energy is not a reliable source.  It is not able to generate enough power at a consistent rate for people to power their homes.  In other words, if there is no wind, there is no electricity in your home.

The second issue is the cost of wind farms.  The cost to produce wind energy is more than it is worth.

It costs more than $0.16 per kilowatt/hour for wind.  Currently, we pay approximately $0.09 per kilowatt/hour for hydro for our homes, therefore, tax payers are picking up the tab for the difference. The county of Dufferin would like to shut down the production of wind farms.

The third issue is that…

An Energy Minister who boasts that his decision is supported by Greenpeace is an Energy Minister spectacularly out-of-touch with ordinary voters.

I live in Ontario, Canada’s most populous province. Our Energy Minister is a gent named Bob Chiarelli.

From my perspective, his primary responsibility is to keep energy prices as low as possible. As Germany and other jurisdictions have discovered, when electricity costs too much, businesses flee – taking jobs with them (see here, here, here and here).

Working families, young people near the bottom of the wage ladder, and seniors on fixed incomes all have especially tight budgets. The more these people are forced to pay for electricity, the fewer dollars they have to spend on other things. Like food.

In recent years, electricity prices here in Ontario have risen dramatically. This is largely the result of our government pursuing renewable energy policies without doing…

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Energy Bosses Call for End to Subsidies for Wind, Solar Power
Group Includes CEOs From Eni, GDF Suez and E.ON
The Wall Street Journal
Géraldine Amiel
11 October 2013

BRUSSELS – Top executives of companies that provide half of Europe’s electricity production capacity on Friday called on politicians to end “distorting” subsidies for wind and solar power, saying the incentives have led to whopping bills for households and businesses and could cause continent-wide blackouts.

Speaking at a news conference here, chief executives of 10 energy producers also urged European Union authorities to compensate electricity companies that agree to maintain spare capacity on standby – a practice that helps increase the security of Europe’s highly interconnected power grid.

The executives, from utilities including Germany’s E.ON, France’s GDF Suez and Italy’s Eni SpA, blamed rising power prices on policies introduced at the turn of the century, when most European governments sought…

Threat of legal action against wind farm hosts

Hamish Boland-Rudder — Canberra Times — October 29, 2013

An anti-wind farm resident of Collector says he will sue his neighbours should they become turbine hosts as part of a proposed wind farm in the small community north of Canberra.

A proposal for a 63-turbine wind farm at Collector was referred to the Planning Assessment Commission by the NSW Department of Planning late last month, with the recommendation the plan be approved. The commission will hold a meeting in Collector on Tuesday to hear from the public.

But last week, lawyers acting for Friends of Collector president Tony Hodgson sent a letter to landholders who would probably host a turbine. It said there was precedent for legal action as it was “anticipated that the operation of the wind farm will have substantial and actionable adverse affects [sic] upon our Client”.

“By leasing…

Last updated October 7, 2013

In January 2012, Australian anti-tobacco/pro-wind public health activist Simon Chapman compiled a “Summary of main conclusions reached in 17 reviews of the research literature on wind farms and health”. His list, which unsurprisingly ignores many reviews and commentaries that support health concern, and misinterprets even these 17 to support his and the industry’s need to ignore health concerns, has since been used tirelessly as a rhetorical cudgel by the wind industry.

In December 2012, Wayne Gulden in Ontario examined Chapman’s “17 reviews”: He found that: 3 of the reviews didn’t even discuss wind turbines; only 4, maybe 5, were peer reviewed, including one of the reviews that didn’t mention wind turbines; only 1 was independent from pro-wind interests (but was not peer reviewed); and the majority based their conclusions on only 4 studies, added to which Gulden suggests a 5th, published after most of…

These Liberal criminals should all be in prison.