Despite appeal of wind energy, projects have foes
By Kevin Miller
Saturday, June 16, 2007 - Bangor Daily News
Stetson Mountain is more ridgeline than mountain, running like a backbone for six miles through the rolling hills that dominate Washington County’s northernmost border with Canada.
Moderate winds sweep across those hills from Canada and pick up speed as they zoom up Stetson Mountain, which at roughly 1,100 feet is among the tallest ridges in this sparsely peopled corner of Maine.
That combination of high winds and low population has one company seeing green.
Sometime next year, 38 wind turbines — each standing about 390 feet tall from base to blade tip — would begin spinning atop the Stetson ridgeline if Evergreen Wind Power’s vision comes to fruition.
The wind farm, which would be New England’s largest if constructed today, would generate enough pollution-free energy to power 27,500 Maine households and help avert more than 100,000 tons of air pollution annually, according to the developer.
The $100 million Stetson project is one of three major wind farms pending with state regulators. And more proposals are on the way, thanks to Maine’s ample wind and the growing political and social appetite for "green" energy sources.
Yet siting a wind farm is no simple task, even in environmentally conscious states like Maine.
One major project in the western mountains was recently spared all-but-certain regulatory death only after the developer slashed the number of turbines to minimize the impact on scenic views and wildlife, two pillars of Maine’s economy.
So far, the Stetson project has raised relatively few alarms.
Standing on a dusty but well-used logging road that runs along Stetson’s spine, Matt Kearns said that UPC Wind Management, the parent company of Evergreen Wind Power, considered many potential sites throughout rural Maine.
Stetson Mountain looked fairly good on paper, but it wasn’t until the wind monitoring results came back that the company realized the site’s potential, he said. UPC is also the developer of the Mars Hill wind farm in Aroostook County, the only sizable wind energy facility operating in Maine today.
"One of the great things about this site is there are already roads here and, second, there are no homes," said Kearns, director of project development for Massachusetts-based UPC. "We picked Stetson as a solution to what we see as the basic siting questions in Maine."
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