Westport in Brief!
EverythingWestport.com
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Quick Article Index . . .
Westport’s
“The Stone Man” contributes hardscaping skills to WRG’s “Rockery.”
No spin zone at Noquochoke Orchards.
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Westport’s “The Stone Man” contributes
hardscaping skills to WRG’s “Rockery.” EverythingWestport.com Thursday,
May 13, 2010
The original “Rockery” was demolished
to make way for the new southend fire station’s main entrance. The Westport
River Gardeners were allowed to replicate their landscaping project to the
east of the station. Demers specializes in stone walls,
chimneys, stone fascia, and just about any decorative outdoor setting
involving stone that are you can imagine. But part of his vocation, and the one
probably closet to his heart, is ornamental stone carving. A fine example is
the piece he carved and donated to the Westport Elementary School a few years
ago, and that now sits in a floral setting outside the school’s main
entrance. To contact Ron Demers please call
(508) 496-3381, or email him at: StoneMan@AmericanStoneWorks.org
Top: Ron Demers of American Stoneworks places the last stone in place,
finishing the “Rockery’s” foundation. Above,
left: Demers with his stone carving, surrounded by Syberian Irises at the Westport Elementary School. Above,
right: WRG chairperson Geri
Fortier holding a watercolor of their current project, the “Rockery” now
underway at the new fire station. No spin zone at
Noquochoke Orchards. EverythingWestport.com Friday,
May 21, 2010
http://www.northeastwindpower.com/
George
Smith and Doris Mills decided to go green when Mills learned on her trips to
Boston’s produce markets that other farms were evaluating the technology. “They
convinced me it was the way to go,” Mills said. So
far the area’s largest apple orchard hasn’t taken much of a bite out of their
electricity bill. NStar, Westport’s electric company, prefers to promote their "NStar Green," a new NStar program that if you sign up, your home electricity will come from a wind farm, which produces no CO2, rather than from power plants, which produce CO2 from burning gas/coal/oil. An average household will pay an extra $7 per month on an average electric bill of $100/month. No one said it was cheap to go green.
Smith and Mills are finding this out as they “Northeast Windpower was to provide some perfectly capable trip relays that have been in use with other comparable turbines across the country,” said Scott Fryer, Northeast Air installer. But NStar told WJAR’s Heim that the relay was neither UL certified nor utility grade. They want the farm to install more NStar’s more expensive equipment that would add up to $5000 per turbine to make the connection. Not true says Fryer. “Our trip relay is UL certified and only costs $200 per turbine to install.” But the power company says their concerned about the safety of their network. But any power the farm’s turbines produce would be equivalent to adding a glass of water to the South Watuppa Pond, hardly the kind of energy that could inflict harm to NStar’s powerful grid. It’s all about the
cash! The truth of the matter is that NStar may view these new turbines, now quiet enough for average home use, as a threat to their distribution model. The orchard uses at peak about $1700 per month in electrical power. Multiply that number by thousands of households and you get the picture. It’s all about billing for kilowatt hours. NStar wants to be a provider of green power, an effort Larry
Chretien, executive director of the Massachusetts Energy Consumers Alliance,
said violates the 1997 state utility restructuring law. “Massachusetts law
does not authorize distribution companies to deliver green product offerings
to consumers," he said. However, the state utilities commission said it was approving National Grid's “GreenUp” program, which markets the alliance's green power plan, only because it "ensures that, at such time that competitive options develop for smaller customers, the competitive market, and not distribution companies, will deliver 'green' product offerings to customers." Smith has had conversations with Governor Deval Patrick’s office, a strong supporter of alternative energy, and Westport’s State Rep. Michael Rodrigues. Both are trying to get the matter resolved with NStar. Governor Deval Patrick has been a
long-time champion of pioneering efforts to promote clean and renewable
energy, but apparently that effort doesn’t include individual homes and farms.
Little help has come from his office.
Left: This greenhouse will be powered
by one of the wind turbines. Right: Channel 10’S cameraman and reporter
R.J. Heim get a tour of the interconnection hardware to NStar’s power grid. Net Metering is the key to wind turbine affordability. With federal and state money
dwindling, and agricultural and other grants shrinking in size, the practice
of net metering provides a revenue steam to wind turbine owners that allow
them to recoup investment money by selling back to the power grid any excess
electricity at full cost. They can even allocate excess electricity to
relatives, friends and neighbors providing they are in the same district as
the electric power distributor. Without net metering and government
grants, the cost of implementing wind power is far beyond the reach of small
farms and home owners. Burdensome costs connecting to NStar’s grid just puts up
higher roadblocks to installing home-based, induction-based wind turbines. “This is an industry in change,” says
Fryer. “These turbines are now efficient and quiet appliances, and should be
treated as such. NStar has been evaluating our problem and others like it
through periodic interconnection hearings. They always come back with the
same answer: their tariff sets the requirements and rates.” “These turbines are in use in many
other areas of the country with comparable $200 trip relays,” Fryer said. We
asked NStar to revaluate their tariff, which has provisions for exceptions.
So far it’s been we’ll get back to you in two weeks. They are being obstructive.” “We’re losing hundreds of dollars per
month waiting for NStar’s answer,” Smith said. “They are just not being
cooperative.” The local wind at Noquochoke Orchards
needs help to spin the blades of Smith’s turbines. There is plenty of bureaucratic
government and corporate enthusiasm for wind power, but that blustery wind
doesn’t seem to reach Westport. - - - - - End -
- - - - © 2010 Community Events
of Westport All rights reserved. EverythingWestport.com |
struggle with NStar to connect
their new, state-of-the-art induction motor turbines to NSTAR’s power grid.
