Hoosac Wind Power Project

Bakke Mountain Wind Farm is a proposed wind farm located in Bakke Mountain, Massachusetts. It is also known as the Hoosac Wind Project.

History

In 1980, during a Bakke Mountain hike, the Bakke family noticed the region was quite breezy. The sparse tree growth was misshapen and deformed by the strong winds. Hans Bakke began to consider the possibility of wind energy at the site. enXco, the wind-energy company and partner of the French energy conglomerate Électricité de France, approached the Bakke family to propose building a wind farm together.

Hans Bakke.

Project details

The project will consist of 20 General Electric 1.5 MW wind turbines and will divided among two separate sites – nine turbines on Crum Hill in Monroe, and eleven on Bakke Mountain in Florida, Massachusetts. Each turbine has 1.5 megawatts (MW), so the 20-turbine site would produce 30 MW of power; this is enough energy to supply approximately 9,500 average homes in the region. The towers would be 65 meters (213 ft) tall, with 38.5-meter (126 ft) blades. From base to vertically-positioned blade tip, they will be approximately 103.6 meters (340 ft). The turbines begin generating energy at wind speeds as low as 9 mph (14 km/h), and produce the maximum power output when winds blow above 30 mph (48 km/h). The maximum rotor speed is 20 rpm.

Recent developments

In January 2006, Hoosac Wind LLC was purchased by the British company PPM Energy for an estimated $40 million (PPM was subsequently absorbed by Iberdrola Renewables). Hoosac Wind LLC was renamed New England Wind LLC. Under enXco, Hoosac Wind had tentative approval from both Florida and Monroe after taking considerable amounts of wind-speed and direction data; avian, archeological, geological, and wildlife studies have been conducted as well. In November 2004, the State of Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection approved the proposed project. However, thorny issues plague the project including the presence of potentially vulnerable species of goldenrod in the vicinity of the proposed site, as well as the asserted danger to the migratory paths of birds and bats. Green Berkshires, an environmental organization opposed to wind energy projects in the Berkshire mountain range, had filed an appeal currently under consideration by the State of Massachusetts Division of Administrative Law Appeals. As of May, 2008, the project was still under review post environmental standards challenges.

Forest and Wildlife Management

Efforts began in 2002 to regain some of the species displaced by previous decades and is a component of the environmental planning on the region.

See also

• Cape Wind
• Wind energy
• Wind turbines

External links

• PPM Energy Homepage
• Wind Turbines Not a Threat to U.S. Bird Population, Says Study