To the Editor:

In the January 11-17 2017 issue of North Country This Week a full-page ad was placed by Concerned Citizens for Rural Preservation stating various facts.

Let’s call these facts ducks. As stated, the taxes for the five dams in Parishville paid $1,940,326 to St. Lawrence County, the Town of Parishville and Parishville-Hopkinton School District.

These dams generate 76.5 megawatts and since the turbines are to generate 1.83 times as much power, they should pay 1.83 times what the dams pay in taxes, or $3,550,797.

In the real world taxes are assessed by property value, not 21st Century vs. 20th century technology. Are you seriously equating property values of an acre on the river in Parishville with and acre of cornfield in Hopkinton? I never met anyone wanting to build a camp overlooking a cornfield! Bang…dead duck.

Next, is wind energy clean, they asked? Their fact that “1 MW of wind turbine capacity requires 150 tons of coal” is interesting. It sounds like 150 tons less coal used for each MW of wind power. If that’s the case, then the more turbines on the grid, the less coal we have to use even to produce the turbines. That’s a good thing. So, what’s your point? Bang!

Moving on, they stated that “thousands upon thousands of trees are cut down and chipped to create access roads for the purpose of constructing turbines.” True, trees will be cut in some instances, but really...thousands upon thousands?

These turbines are being sited mainly in open fields. That’s what we have, a lot of open fields, with access from county or state roads and roads which all farmers have built to accommodate their equipment. Did you protest over the “thousands upon thousands” of trees cut down to run the power lines from Hopkinton parallel to State Highway 72 to Parishville? Those power lines came anyway and they were good, weren’t they? Bang!

Onward, “the amount of land covered in cement is simply staggering.” I’ll tell you what’s staggering…seeing the abutments poured for the Veranzano bridge in New York City. That went on for months! From what we heard, each turbine will sit on an acre of land. If that’s concrete, what’s it to you if it’s not your land? The analogy of 3x3x1mile sidewalk is cute though....bang!

What’s next? Ah…the birds. Yes, turbines kill birds and according to Treehugger.com they do so in a miniscule number than the birds killed in collisions with motor vehicles, power and cell towers, buildings and our pets. Also check out the Audubon Society.

The wind industry works with state and federal wildlife and game agencies to mitigate this number by different means all within federal and state standards. Siting is critical and that has been addressed in this project.

But you don’t listen to this at meetings because of all your shouting! So much for the First Amendment. Don’t mention infrasound. That’s for another letter.

Frank and Kelly Potenzano

Hopkinton