LIHU‘E — Community members raised concerns about “visual blight” caused by tall windmill towers and the nuisance of blades’ “whirring sound,” but a proposed bill clearing a path for small wind energy conversion systems could end up getting blown back
LIHU‘E — Community members raised concerns about “visual blight” caused by tall windmill towers and the nuisance of blades’ “whirring sound,” but a proposed bill clearing a path for small wind energy conversion systems could end up getting blown back until next year.
The ongoing debate on the merits of SWECS took a back seat to a discussion on the bill’s timing and the overlap between it and the highly anticipated, island-wide energy sustainability plan during the Kaua‘i County Council’s Planning Committee meeting Wednesday at the Historic County Building.
George Costa, county director of economic development, told committee members that the plan’s final report would not be done until January 2010, and Planning Committee Chair Jay Furfaro said he hopes to wait for that plan before moving forward on the SWECS legislation.
“The fact of the matter is I would at least like to see some recommendations. That’s what we paid for,” Furfaro said. “I have made it very clear to them (plan consultants) that on specific short-term projects I would like to see them make some recommendations so that we can move toward ordinances.
“I’m a big proponent to alternative energy, but the timing is critical,” he said.
Former Councilwoman JoAnn Yukimura, a co-sponsor of the bill that funded the energy sustainability plan to the tune of $200,000, said she would “hate to see this proposed bill deferred” until the plan is finalized because she doesn’t believe the plan will produce ordinances with specificity and will instead simply instruct government to streamline the permitting process for renewable energy projects.
“Now, as we move into an energy sustainability world … we need to adjust our laws to look at the issues,” Yukimura said, adding she agrees with Apollo Kaua‘i’s Laurel Brier in that the SWECS bill can “run parallel” with the overriding energy plan.
“We shouldn’t use a late plan to further delay laws that would appropriately facilitate” renewable energy, Yukimura said. “All it does is delay your doing what has to be done. … Time is of the essence.”
Tim Bynum read e-mails he had received from the consultant, Doug Hinrichs of Sentech.
“Just wanted to weigh in here real quickly saying that any legislation that promotes clean energy — such as the SWECS does — certainly dovetails with the Kaua‘i Energy Sustainability Plan, in my humble opinion,” Hinrichs wrote. “Some of these technologies are fully commercialized … so it makes sense that they come online earlier than, e.g., ocean wave technologies. That’s of course on the technical and economic plane — I’ll leave it up to you guys/gals to figure out the politics 😉 (winking smiley emoticon).”
Similarly, sub-contractor Maurice Kaya told Bynum in an e-mail that “Proceeding with such a policy is expected to be consistent with the intent of the Kaua‘i Energy Sustainability Plan.”
“Besides utility scale renewable energy technology, small-scale customer-sited renewable energy systems are expected to be an important part of a broad strategy to achieve greater energy independence,” Kaya wrote. “Wind energy, just like solar thermal and solar photovoltaic systems, can be encouraged at the customer level as prudent public policy.”
Among the major concerns about the ordinance is the maximum height — measured from the ground to the tip of the rotor blade when extended vertically. If SWECS are limited to existing maximum building heights, they will have difficulty catching the wind as other structures in the area will get in the way.
Critics like Ken Taylor say SWECS will be a visual blight on the natural beauty of Kaua‘i, blocking neighbors’ viewplanes, and others, like Carl Imparato, worry about the “trade-off between sustainability and people hearing noise at 3 a.m.”
The bill, as originally written, would allow tower-mounted SWECS a maximum total height of 20 feet higher than the existing maximum building height in any given zoning district, and would allow roof-mounted SWECS to reach 10 feet above the roof line.
If passed, the bill would generally permit tower-mounted SWECS in Residential and Neighborhood Commercial zoning districts on lots at least one acre in size, and restrict them to one per acre. In Commercial zones, tower-mounted SWECS would be allowed on lots at least 20,000 square feet in size — just under half an acre — and restricted to one per every 20,000 square feet.
In Agricultural zones, one tower-mounted SWEC would be generally permitted for each lot one acre or larger, with an additional allowance for each additional three acres in the same lot, with a maximum of five windmills on any one lot. In Open zones, tower-mounted SWECS would be generally permitted on lots at least five acres in size, with limitations of one SWEC for every five acres and a five-SWECS total for any one lot.
Tower-mounted SWECS would be generally permitted in Industrial zones, and roof-mounted SWECS would be generally permitted in residential, industrial, commercial, agricultural and open zoning districts, with presumably the only limitation being the number of roofs on a given lot and the economic practicality of multiple windmills.
Tower-based and roof-mounted SWECS in other zoning districts, on smaller lots, or exceeding other restrictions would be required to obtain use permits.
With Bynum and colleague Lani Kawahara seeming to align themselves in the camp of not waiting for the final study, Furfaro at one point said, “It looks like I’m in the minority,” but remaining questions for the county attorney, Planning Department and the plan’s consultant convinced the committee to defer the matter for two weeks.
No amendments were taken up Wednesday, but council members circulated one and alluded to others that could be impacted by answers to their questions of the administration.
Proposals related to farm worker housing and shoreline setback and coastal protection were similarly deferred for two weeks, also by unanimous 4-0 votes. Committee member Derek Kawakami was absent and excused Wednesday. He left last week’s meeting to attend a conference on the Mainland. Chair Kaipo Asing and Dickie Chang are non-voting committee members.
For full coverage of the farm worker housing and shoreline setback bills, as well as the latest results of Kawahara and Bynum’s recent push for greater government transparency, see upcoming editions of The Garden Island.
• Michael Levine, assistant news editor, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 252) or mlevine@kauaipubco.com
