Disturbing News About Cherry Springs State Park

[Dave Mitsky]

Cherry Springs State Park (http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/parks/cherrysprings_darkskies.aspx), Pennsylvania's official dark sky park, may be once again facing a possible crisis. Here's an article on the energy company AES and their "wind farm" proposal for Potter County.

http://www.bradfordera.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=17332245&BRD=52&PAG=461&dept_id=569780&rfi=6

The DCNR does not have the authority to block such a scheme on private property so political/legal action may be necessary.

Dave Mitsky

----- Original Message -----
From: chipmaxharrison at peoplepc.com
To: Cherry Springs
Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2006 14:26
Subject: We need your help!

Attention all users of Cherry Springs State Park!
There is currently a movement to install a very large Wind Turbine
farm across several ridges just north of Rt. 6 and possibly within in
site of CSSP. These wind turbine towers are estimated to be as high
is a 40 story building and the company installing them claims they
will be outfitted with strobing white lights, further destroying the
valuable dark night skies of Potter County. Won't you please take a
moment to either sign and forward the following petition on to DCNR
or send your own message to DCNR Secretary Michael Diberardinis. The
astronomers of CSSP are a very strong listened to voice and we need
you to be vocal now! We need to get this information to the
Secretary within the next two weeks. Please copy and paste
the petition below.
Thanks in advance!!
Maxine Harrison, Director
CSSP Dark Sky Fun

mdiberardi at state.pa.us

Dear Secretary Diberardinis,
One of the most treasured assets of Potter County is its dark night
sky. DCNR took the meaningful step to protect this resource by making
Cherry Springs State Park a Dark Sky Preserve ensuring forever that
this unique resource and valuable part of the PA Wilds Tourism
initiative would be managed and protected. Now this highly valued
resource is being threatened by the possible construction of a Wind
Turbine Farm in the Fox Hill region just north of Cherry Springs
State Park. The height of turbines and proposed 24 hour strobe
lighting on these turbines will most certainly create conditions
destructive to star gazing and night time astronomy activities in the
park and county. By signing this petition we state that we are
opposed to this project in Potter County, discourage the use of state
funded subsidies for this venture and hope that you will continue
through your authority in DCNR to protect this Natural Resource
before it is lost forever.

Signed:
First Name:
Last Name:
Street Address:
City, State, Zip:
email address:
phone number:

[redshifter]

Man that sucks! I lost a good dark sky site a couple years back to developers as well.

[Dave Mitsky]

Wind farms may not be all they're cracked up to be.

http://www.protectpendleton.com/

http://www.protectpendleton.com/nbw_index.htm

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20050420/ai_n14591193

http://www.globalwarming.org/article.php?uid=71

I find this situation quite ironic given the money the state is
spending on CSSP and promoting the Pennsylvania Wilds.

http://www.visitpa.com/visitpa/regionsDetail.pa?regionid=2

Dave Mitsky

[Dave Mitsky]

Here are a few more links that portray the con side of the issue.

http://www.fairwind.org.uk/

http://www.protectruralscotland.com/

http://www.countryguardian.net/

Dave Mitsky

[Ronald Brak]

Could the strobe lights on the wind turbines be replaced with red lights so they'll cause less damage to observations?

Personally I think wind turbines are kind of groovey. We haven't had any real problems here South Australia except with one catching on fire and they save a fair bit of natural gas. Mind you we have some fairly steady winds here. The plan is to get the state up to 20% wind power which is about as high as it can go before its intermittancy becomes too much of a problem to be handled cheaply.

[Dave Mitsky]

Ronald,

Did you read any of the information on wind farms on the links I supplied? Try http://www.protectpendleton.com/nbw_index.htm in particular. Wind turbines do not seem to be a good idea, both environmentally and economically, according to the research I've done.

Dave Mitsky

[Dave Mitsky]

Have a look at what a Republican Congressman, no less, has to say about wind energy -
http://www.stopillwind.org/lowerlevel.php?content=GoodAndBad

Dave Mitsky

[Eoanthropus Dawsoni]

The strobes on those things can be horrible if they run them at night. The wind farms around this area all run a white strobe during the day and switch over to a red beacon at night. When they do that there are no problems. However once in a while the strobes do not switch off at night and the damn things light up the sky for miles. Fortunately the things are located near a major highway and are so bright that when they operate at night in fog or snow conditions the reflected light will blind drivers. So, for traffic safety they have to turn the strobes off at night.

[Eoanthropus Dawsoni]

I am not a big fan of wind energy. Here in North Dakota they are putting up wind farms as fast and they can get the components trucked in. We have plenty of wind here but I still do not think it makes sense to build the things. North Dakota already has more electricity than we can use (hydroelectric and coal fired power stations). Much of it could be transmitted to Minnesota and other states however people tend to go bonkers at the thought of a power transmission line passing overhead. Dairy farmers in Minnesota have sued and won claiming that the power lines bother their cows.

[Matherly]

So, let me get this straight...

Coal is bad
Natural Gas is bad
Gasoline is bad
Nuclear is bad
Hydroelectric is bad
Wind is bad

Exactly how are we supposed to get our power? Or is it time to start heading back to the trees?

("And some people even said that the trees were a bad idea, and that no one should have left the oceans")

[Kaptain K]

So, let me get this straight...

Coal is bad
Natural Gas is bad
Gasoline is bad
Nuclear is bad
Hydroelectric is bad
Wind is bad

Exactly how are we supposed to get our power? Or is it time to start heading back to the trees?

("And some people even said that the trees were a bad idea, and that no one should have left the oceans")
You missed one:

Coal is bad
Natural Gas is bad
Gasoline is bad
Nuclear is bad
Hydroelectric is bad
Wind is bad
Solar is bad