Recently the Island Institute’s role in the Fox Islands Wind project has been questioned by some of the wind farm neighbors and others in various media reports. It might be of interest to readers of The Working Waterfront to understand the role the Island Institute has been asked to fulfill in this project.

More than two and a half years ago, the Fox Islands Electric Co-op (FIEC) asked the Island Institute to provide technical, financial and public education/outreach resources in support of their goal of reducing islanders’ dependence on expensive electricity imported to the island via a submarine cable. The Island Institute helped find funding, helped secure low interest loans and located investors in order for the co-op and its ratepayers to achieve their goal of constructing three turbines on a hill top on Vinalhaven that local islanders had purchased for that express purpose.

In July of 2008, the ratepayers from both island communities (Vinalhaven and North Haven) approved the financial and technical plan that George Baker, then a professor at the Harvard Business School, had developed to stabilize energy costs at an annual average of approximately 6 cents per kilowatt hour. The vote passed with 98 percent of ratepayers approving the plan.

This past May after seven months of operation, FIEC circulated another survey of ratepayers (approximately 1,800 on both islands) and asked, among other questions, whether in comparison to the vote before the turbines were operational are you a). As supportive, b). More supportive, c). Less supportive of the Fox Islands Wind project? Of the more than 500 surveys that were returned, 95 percent of ratepayers indicated they were “as supportive” or “more supportive” of the wind farm.

A review of the several hundred comments that accompanied the survey responses highlights the reasons for this support. The project has met or exceeded its production goals and lowered monthly bills as projected. The turbines have operated reliably, standing up to the strong winds that we know sweep across Penobscot Bay. In their comments, many island residents also voiced a strong sense of pride that their community was able to develop and now control the generation of their own more affordable and cleaner energy source.

Local ownership and control is the reality for the Fox Islands Electric Co-op Board of Directors, particularly as it has confronted concerns raised about noise. The Co-op has worked to address concerns in its monthly meetings, in mailings to ratepayers and most notable in a Noise Reduced Operation study last February. It has also asked for some additional technical assistance from the Island Institute.

The Island Institute responded by helping to organize a team from the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL), part of the U.S. Department of Energy, to study the sound issues on Vinalhaven and to outline potential mitigation options. The NREL study was described at a public information meeting on Vinalhaven in August hosted by the Institute where the experts presented their proposed methods. The study relies on neighbors submitting detailed logs of when the turbine noise is most bothersome so that the experts can carefully identify various options to reduce the noise effects on neighbors without putting the project’s larger economic goals in jeopardy.  Fox Islands ratepayers will ultimately be able to vote on which of these options they would like to adopt.

The Island Institute also helped secure a $25,000 seed grant from the Maine Technology Institute to explore the use of Active Noise Cancellation technology to mitigate the effects of turbine noise on neighbors. This highly technical work is ongoing, but preliminary results from Conquest Innovations, a Freeport-based acoustical engineering firm, look promising in terms of reducing the amount of turbine noise neighbors hear in their homes.

Unfortunately none of the major media stories have mentioned these facts – of the local support for the project and the efforts to respond to concerns – preferring instead to focus on the critical comments from those neighbors who are deeply aggrieved. The neighbors who have complained about being “abandoned” are incorrect. The Boards of the Fox Islands Electric Co-op, Fox Islands Wind and the Island Institute remain vigilantly involved. However, the Island Institute is not a decision maker in this project and never has been. The decision makers are the owners of the project-the FIEC ratepayers and the board of directors of FIEC who represent all the ratepayers. The co-op board’s job is to balance the complaints from their neighbors whose peace and quiet has been violated with the overall benefits to the community. It is not an easy task, but the co-op is not some off-island multi-national organization; they are neighbors of the neighbors.

Criticism of these volunteer board members of FIEC detracts from efforts to engage the Fox Islands community to find solutions and makes the issue …risks alienating the affected neighbors from the rest of their fellow citizens whom they need to convince to make any operational changes above and beyond what Department of Environmental Protection may require.

None of us can believe everything we read in the newspapers. However, as a commentator once said, “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts.”

Sincerely,

Philip Conkling

President of the Island Institute and Publisher of The Working Waterfront