West Virginia Highlands Voice

By George E. Beetham Jr.

People who support wind farms on mountain ridges keep referring to those who oppose them as “NIMBY’s”, an acronym for Not In My Back Yard. I have to admit to being puzzled why people think everybody who opposes wind in the mountains is either a NIMBY or a wind opponent.

I am neither. I am, if anything, a YIMBY. That is, Yes In My Back Yard. I live in southeastern Pennsylvania outside of Philadelphia. Electricity generated in the mountains of West Virginia is marketed in Philadelphia and other major urban centers

I see several problems with this. First and foremost, if the cities are the major users of electricity, and anybody who has visited any East Coast city would have to agree that we are major users, then why shouldn’t the generation facilities be close to where the electricity is used? There are designs for wind turbines that can sit atop skyscrapers, in effect providing the electricity the building needs. Granted, current buildings would have to be retrofitted, but I would prefer to see that instead of wind turbines along Appalachian ridges. Build turbines along the medians of interstates.

I live in the city. I go to the mountains of West Virginia to experience what is left of nature here in the East. Admittedly, there isn’t a whole lot left, but that makes what is left that much more valuable and meaningful. And I submit that its highest and best value is as wilderness, or at least natural.

Transmitting electricity from mountains to cities involves high capacity transmission lines, like TRAIL, which will degrade even more natural land. Further, transmitting wind generated power over long distances is very inefficient. Much of the generated power is lost along the way; only a fraction of it actually gets to the city.

With mountaintop removal devastating wide areas of West Virginia, why in the world would you want to see what little natural areas there are left in the state crowned with wind turbines poking their way above treeline into the sky? Can’t one area of West Virginia remain free of blight? Can’t we have a sliver of wilderness left?

If wind power would stop mountaintop removal, I could understand why people would be for it. But wind will never provide more than a fraction of our electricity needs no matter how many ridges are ruined with towers. There are two things that are generated in the mountains of eastern West Virginia that we sorely need: water and forests that store carbon dioxide and give off oxygen. Stripping trees off a ridge and planting wind turbines will have the effect of lessening the water retention capabilities of the mountains, and obviously have negative impacts on global warming.

It’s time for the cities, my back yard, to take on the responsibility for producing the power we over-use. If we are the energy hogs, then we should bear the burden here, in the cities. And if we are not willing to bear the burden, then guess what? The lights should start going out.

It seems to me that for too long development of urban America has plundered the wilds of West Virginia for its needs. It pains me to see native West Virginians pointing fingers at one another, grasping for panaceas for problems they have not created. Wind power is no panacea. It is not going to save one single coal bearing mountain from being plundered. It will never be more than a drop in the bucket if we depend on all the mountain ridges in West Virginia. Build the generation capacity where it will be used. That is the message that West Virginians should be rising up and shouting in unison.

And why would power companies not locate wind generators in cities? Because too many residents – the real NIMBYs – would object to it and the cost would escalate because of court fights. West Virginians should have enough pride in place to fight for your own back yards and shift the burden back on the people burning the lights all night long. All of West Virginia should rise up and oppose the abortion of mountaintop destruction, done for a few brief hours of power in some city that looks like a Christmas tree on steroids. The problem is my back yard and the solution should not be more blight in West Virginia. We destroyed our natural land long ago. What would a few more wind turbines mean here?

Frankly, West Virginia’s answer to the rest of the country should be to cut us off. The cities are what is destroying West Virginia. The mountains define West Virginia, known after all as the Mountain State. If West Virginia wants to market something, market the mountains as places where people can go to find a piece of nature – hike a trail, fish a stream, look off at ridge after ridge to infinity with no sign of human blight.

Whenever I travel to West Virginia, I cannot help but spend some of my Yankee dollars. Gas, food, lodging, maple syrup, sausage, produce from farms … I leave the Mountain State with less money than I enter it with, trust me. But if all you have to offer is wind turbines stretching from horizon to horizon, or mountaintop destruction, then somebody else is going to get my money.

Mountain ridges are not desert. They are not barren. The rain forests of eastern West Virginia have more value than anybody could imagine. The area is a natural watershed. Water is released slowly, providing water that flows to cities. The oxygen is breathed by millions. The forest is home to amazing creatures and plants that exist nowhere else in the world.

Few of us have any remote idea what amazing things can be found in the rain forests of the Monongahela National Forest. New discoveries pique my curiosity from time to time, things we have not learned in hundreds of years. Those are the things for which we should fight. Those are the things that are protected by wilderness. Those are things that may not be around much longer if we keep industrializing our last remaining eastern wilderness.

That is why I am against wind generation in the West Virginia highlands. I am saying, yes, in my back yard, not in your back yard.

My impression of West Virginia when I made my first trip to your state was that it consisted of endless wilderness that stretched on forever. Sadly that was only an illusion, a fact I now realize as I see wind turbines rearing up above the hills from too many once scenic vistas. I’ve seen mountaintop destruction at Kayford and listened to Larry Gibson and Maria Gunnoe, two eloquent people who can tell us the true cost of this destructive form of coal mining.

I’ve seen that, and I’ve seen wind turbines on the horizon from the Monongahela National Forest. And I wonder to myself, why West Virginians allow people to come into your once beautiful state and rape it. Do West Virginians see the mountains as simply something to be exploited, never mind the cost? I understand the need for economic development. But raping the mountains is not going to increase the standard of living.

Look at the blight of eastern cities. Is that what you want? Do you think urban dwellers are ennobled because of blight? I have to tell you that it has the exact opposite effect. That is why many urban dwellers seek out wilderness, to escape dreary blight. Maybe we’ve found something that West Virginians have forgotten. Maybe we prize nature over industrialization.

At the same time, we urban residents are the reason they’re building wind turbines along ridges in West Virginia, and why they’re blowing up mountains right and left. We should bear the cost, not you. It should be in my back yard, not yours. And you should not be pointing fingers at one another, but at us energy hogs who have no idea of the true human and natural cost of burning lights all night long.

George E. Beetham Jr. is a newspaper editor in Philadelphia, a
former board member of the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy,
and a believer that nature has power to heal the human
soul.

Editor’s Note: The illustration accompanying this story is a generic
energy hog. It bears absolutely no resemblance to George
Beetham, living or dead.