What a year 2012 was for energy development in Vermont: Controversy swirled around projects both large and (relatively) small. Opposition to the construction of a 21-turbine project on the Lowell Mountains drove some protestors to civil disobedience, and prompted a few arrests. Watching the turbines rise on the Northeast Kingdom ridgeline prompted dismay in some, pride in others — and no shortage of opinions and headlines all around.
For this two-part post, Seven Days went back to some of the big players in the energy debate — opponents and proponents, citizen activists and wind developers — for their perspectives on a busy, sometimes tumultuous year. What did 2012 mean for energy development in Vermont — and what might 2013 bring?
Today we hear from the more outspoken critics of recent energy developments. We’ll be back tomorrow with more voices.
Lukas Snelling, director of Energize Vermont
“This was the year that a lot of Vermonters started to recognize where their electricity came from, and became active in making decisions about where they’d like to see their future energy come from. That goes well beyond the wind issue. In a lot of ways, 2012 was the first year when the renewable energy movement hit the road running. …The ability to have a meaningful conversation hasn’t yet caught up to the number of people who are actively engaging — but I think it will. The more the merrier.”
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What 2012 brought in terms of energy development was the realization and understanding that despite decades of protecting the enviornment and natural beauty of Vermont a few far liberal politicians took a page from Obama’s playbook and decided it best to ram through policies they believe in regardless of opposition, public opinion, and the calling for a moratorium by more reasoned legislators.
As Peter Shumlin has said “[he] gets the tough things done.”
whether you like it or not…
Whether YOU like it or not …
Next up…pipelines. Having bravely banned fracking in a state that has no gas to frack, the powers that be are now gearing up to use Vermont’s public roads as utility corridors to bring fracked gas to a few new users in Addison County (all paid for by existing users in Chittenden and Franklin Counties). However most of the gas (70%) will be headed straight for Int’l Paper in NY, with no service for most of the towns who are now supposed to accept living with a high-pressure industrial transmission pipeline running right through their front yards.
Oh, those poor, poor people who will have to “accept living with a high-pressure industrial transmission pipeline running right through their front yards!” You mean running through the state rights-of-way that are designed exactly for this purpose? For the purpose of bringing electricity and cable TV and natural gas to society? Give us our cable TV so we can watch Dancing With The Stars! But don’t you dare use the right-of-way to bring natural gas to somebody else! Guess what, the entire rest of the world has natural gas pipelines running under the streets, and nobody cares.
More NIMBY whining from selfish Vermonters. That’s Vermont’s real pastime, NIMBY whining.
Well, Sutton Hoo, actually, the backyard IS where we want it. Because 300-500′ behind the houses is an existing utility corridor for VELCO, which is where a transmission pipeline of this size belongs. It does not belong in the road, which BTW, is a town RoW, not a state RoW, because it is not a distribution pipe, which is what you DO put in the road, and if they WERE to put a distribution pipe in the road, it would get probably get support as well, because it would mean that VGS was actually offering natural gas service. So, not a case of NIMBYism here, just a case of you not having the slightest idea what you are talking about.
You don’t like a gas pipe under the road on a ROW, unseen? Tough. BY any definition, that’s NIMBYism, pure and simple.