DETROIT SCHOOLS LIKE SMALL WIND

Home windmills spin debate; Cities are imposing restrictions, bans
Bill Laitner, April 18, 2010 (Detroit Free Press)

"…[S]mall wind turbines designed for urban homes, small businesses and schools -- which cost $15,000 to $30,000 -- are generating debate in some Detroit suburbs.

"Facing requests from homeowners, Royal Oak enacted a zoning ordinance last year to regulate home-based wind turbines, with Birmingham and Novi soon to do so…[The Birmingham Planning Board…voted 7-0 to ban wind turbines in residential areas, restricting them to commercial districts and to areas of mixed-use zoning where condos coexist with shops. The ban could get final approval…by the City Commission."

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"Among the concerns? The injury risk of turbines spinning near people, the threat of towers being residential eyesores and the quality-of-life fear of flicker -- the distraction of sunlight flashing off moving blades, like a strobe light that belongs in a nightclub…

"Royal Oak's ordinance, passed last year, is less restrictive, allowing wind turbines at twice the maximum permitted height for homes -- about 60 feet -- and up to 100 feet in other zoning districts…No residents have applied for a permit…Novi's new ordinance might get final approval in May…"

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"A single, $20,000 wind turbine could power a small home…[but requires 14 m.p.h. wind] which in Michigan puts ideal sites at high elevations or along lake shores…Turbines in southeast Michigan can work in tandem with solar power to provide much of a home's electricity…Schools are exempt from most local zoning, and some have installed turbines for energy classes…

"…A 60-foot tower with a single spinning blade was installed in 2001 at Seaholm High School in Birmingham. And a 30-foot Windspire -- made in Manistee -- is [soon to be operating] at the Birmingham Covington School in Bloomfield Hills…Oakland Schools Technical Campus in Clarkston is to have a $35,000 system of wind and solar…Also getting turbines, as soon as this fall, are Cass Tech High School in Detroit, the Allen Park school district and Woodhaven-Brownstown public schools, paid for by grants from a statewide surcharge on utility bills…"