Gains Achieved | Eastern North Carolina Now

    At today's hearing on H484 at the Environmental Committee, the bill was passed (I don't yet have the specific vote tally as to who voted for or against).

    Although that was a disappointment, the legislators fixed the main item I had brought to their attention: the ridiculously high 3 MW turbine size, that would have exempted essentially all NC wind developments to date. They lowered the limit to what we recommended: 1 MW.

    The bad news is:

    -- Major hurdles for the military to meet still remain, so that it is very unlikely that any wind project will be successfully challenged by the military.

    -- The bird and bat "studies" will still be self-serving, biased documents, written by a shill paid by the applicant. That means there is essentially zero "environmental" protection.

    -- H484 still has zero safeguards for the health, safety and economic impacts of NC citizens near an industrial wind development.

The bottom line still is that H484 does not protect

the MILITARY,
the ENVIRONMENT, or
the PUBLIC.
    Here is Version 2 of the proposed bill.

    Please see my (updated) Comments re H484v2, where I've spelled out what needs to be fixed.

    The next (and last) hearing H484 will have is at the Utility Committee. The bill has not yet been officially scheduled for one of their Wednesday hearings. When it is, it will appear on the H484 website, and I will send you a notice.

    Let me know any questions.

    Thank you for your interest. Please pass this on to other interested NC citizens.

    Regards,

    John Droz, Jr.
    Physicist & Environmental Advocate