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The crowd listens during a Searchlight Town Hall Meeting about a proposed wind energy project at the Searchlight Community Center Thursday, June 25, 2009.
Friday, June 26, 2009 | 2:02 a.m.
Searchlight
SEARCHLIGHT — Duke Energy representative Robert Charlebois began Thursday afternoon’s public meeting on the company’s plans to build a large wind farm here by trying to make clear to residents that he had learned from earlier rejections.
“I remember the first meeting walking out with the unambiguous understanding that our original proposal was completely unacceptable to the town,” Charlebois said of a meeting in January on the wind project. “We went back to the drawing board.”
If Charlebois had hoped to win over residents’ support with a new plan, it didn’t work out that way.
In a nearly unanimous chorus, Searchlight residents came out loudly against the latest iteration of a planned wind project near their town at a community meeting held in the town’s community center and museum hall.
“I think little Searchlight is being thrown under the bus,” said Judy Bundorf, a part-time Searchlight resident and the first of many at the meeting to speak out against the wind farm.
Duke Energy wants to develop up to 370 megawatts of wind energy in the area, through 140 wind turbine generators that each stand about 400 feet tall.
Residents said they were concerned the plans would negatively impact wildlife and affect their views, and several in the crowd were skeptical that renewable energy could be cost-effective.
The public meeting was held as part of the process from the Bureau of Land Management to review the application to impact 600 acres — 200 permanently — of federal desert land near the town of 800 about 60 miles south of Las Vegas.
Clark County Commissioner Steve Sisolak, who said he favors the project, led the proceedings.
About 65 people attended the meeting, and over the course of two hours, a good portion spoke out against the project.
“I moved to Searchlight because I love birds,” said Robert Shawn, who said he recently watched a bald eagle fly near his Yucca plants. “Do we need to ruin their home? Their home is in Searchlight. There’s the whole entire state. I know it’s pretty windy everywhere you go.”
Representing the company, Charlebois explained that Duke Energy had carefully considered that the land around Searchlight was the most feasible place to construct Southern Nevada’s first wind farm.
At Thursday’s meeting, Charlebois was joined at the podium by several representatives of the Bureau of Land Management, who assured residents they would carefully review the impact of the wind turbines on desert tortoises, sheep, birds, and other animals and plants before deciding whether to approve the project.
Searchlight’s wind farm presents an early test of renewable energy developments on public lands in Nevada. Many projects are still in the earlier stages of the time-consuming BLM approval process.
The Obama administration has said that speeding up that process is a top priority because it believes renewable energy developments will help reduce dependence on foreign oil and curb global warming. BLM will not sacrifice careful environmental review of the projects, officials insist.
National and local environmental groups have largely supported sacrificing certain lands for the purpose of slowing climate change, and Nevada Conservation League Executive Director Scot Rutledge represented that view at the meeting Thursday.
Nonetheless, steep hurdles — including concerns about sacrificing desert lands and aesthetics — are likely to persist, particularly among residents who live near the planned projects.
Several meeting participants spoke with fondness of their views of nearby Spirit Mountain, which they said they fear will become adulterated by the tall wind turbines spinning rapidly nearly every day and night.
Charlebois said the company had taken negative comments at an earlier meeting in January into account and was scaling back the project from an initial 180 towers surrounding the town to 140 towers to the east and south of Searchlight. Charlebois said he expects to revise that to reflect plans for even fewer towers soon.
Yet at the meeting, just one Searchlight resident spoke in favor of the project.
bumpkins.
The energy bill being voted on today was actually partially written by Duke Energy! Why is an "environmental group" called The Nevada Conservation League supporting the Energy Bill and making a public statement at this meeting supporting this project? Sounds just a little suspicious considering the amount of wildlife that would be lost and that the views from all surrounding wilderness areas and Lake Mead National Recreation Area would be forever degraded. Wonder how much hush money Duke Energy is throwing around?
See below:
"There is a significant divide within the environmental community over the measure that is being backed by the Obama administration and House Democratic leaders.As the LCV was threatening to pull its endorsement from dissenting members, Friends of the Earth launched a campaign to block the bill. "Corporate polluters including Shell and Duke Energy helped write this bill, and the result is that we're left with legislation that fails to come anywhere close to solving the climate crisis. Worse, the bill eliminates preexisting EPA authority to address global warming--that means it's actually a step backward," says FOE president Brent Blackwelder, a veteran campaigner --- who has often been ahead of the curve when issues of economics and the environment are in play. "...http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/06/24-9
BTW, good article. Thanks for telling the side of the people who would be hurt by this project the most.
This is a much better article than after the January meeting at Searchlight- much fairer. I was there, and this is an accurate reflection of the mood at the meeting.
You can call people "bumpkins" but this resistance to new big energy plans is happening in thousands of towns all across America and won't go away. And Oh, I notice even those city folks in Henderson did away with plans for that transmission line over their houses.
these are the same people that LOVE to have power to watch wheel of fortune every night, then turn around and say we are slaves to foreign oil, but god forbid we'd plant some wind turbines in the middle of butt - ugly searchlight.
I have to take exception to comments made by the Sunlizard. The Nevada Conservation League is an outstanding conservation organization which does great work for Nevada, particularly in the local and state political arenas. To insinuate that they can be bought by Duke Energy or anyone is slanderous and a gross disservice to an excellent group. The planet faces an extreme crises if atmospheric CO2 is not brought down to below a level of 350 ppm - and soon. To do this we must cut our ties to oil and coal and develop renewable energy. Unfortuantely this will mean sacrificing some of our desert and other lands. Such is necessary for the long term survival of our species. Careful site selection is needed to minimize the ecological harm, but renewable energy must be quickly developed. Part of the long term answer is mandating roof-top solar whereever possible. But since this will take time and changes in cultural and legal attitudes, large scale renewable projects are needed now.
I can't believe these residents are so resistive to change. I guess renewable energy is too much for them to understand.
I'm actually feeling more sorry for the residents of Searchlight concerning the health affects of having subsonic and vibrational affects from these giant turbines near their houses. The evidence of negative health affects of wind projects near residences is growing, and no one in Nevada is talking about this. In California turbines are required to be offset 2 miles, but Duke used the "center of town" for their offset, meaning that some houses are a mile or less from these 400-foot tall monsters. Does anyone care about human health?