Writer says wind farms are not farms…but industrial sites

A wind turbine falls apart after catching fire. US county governments are increasingly refusing to host renewable energy industries

 

 

As a fight between Oklahoma’s oil and gas industry and the renewable power groups took shape in recent days, it would appear more governments around the U.S. are pulling in the reins on the growth of wind and solar farms.

With 40 years under his belt in the US energy industry, David Blackmon recently wrote we shouldn’t call them “farms” but rather industrial sites. And he cites a growing movement against such “farms” or “sites.”

“Such pushback is likely to grow more strident in the coming years as it becomes clear to citizens that their state governments have failed to enact effective regulatory structures requiring timely and full retirement and remediation of these industrial sites when their useful life has expired,” stated Blackmon.

“By that time, these sites will most likely have been sold off by the big developers who built them to smaller companies that will be unlikely to be able to bear the enormous costs involved in full removal and remediation.”

Click here for his opinion piece