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CommunityHome owners may be allowed to install wind turbines for power
Valley Lee man asks county to change height-restriction rules
Friday, May 2, 2008
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Wind turbines can’t generate electricity in St. Mary’s County because they are not allowed by the zoning ordinance to achieve the height they need. The county commissioners on Tuesday agreed to seek exemptions – for wind turbines to power private homes.
Richard Johnson of Valley Lee has looked into installing a wind turbine on his property and decided it would be feasible and economical. ‘‘The system would supplement most if not all of my house electricity needs,” he wrote to the commissioners.
He found a system that could power his home with an average wind of 10 mph, but would need to be 120 feet tall. He lives on waterfront property off Herring Creek.
Johnson said Wednesday he pays about $5,000 a year in utilities and had been looking at alternative energy sources. Solar power was still too expensive, so he went the wind power route.
‘‘It’s good for the environment, but it’s saving me money” in the long run, he said. If the turbine runs at the average wind of 10 mph, it would produce almost 20,000 kilowatt hours a year, which would offset the 35,000 kilowatts his house uses a year.
The turbine should be quiet, he said.
‘‘Most people said it sounds like a refrigerator when it’s really going,” Johnson said.
Structures of higher than 40 feet for residential use need a conditional use permit. In some commercial zoning, 100-foot structures are permitted. Johnson was told by the county’s land use and growth management office that it would cost $3,000 to introduce a zoning amendment for localized wind turbines.
Commissioner Larry Jarboe (R) and Commission President Francis Jack Russell (D) asked Tuesday afternoon if that fee could be waived.
Denis Canavan, director of land use and growth management, said it could. He called these smaller wind turbines an ‘‘important item the county should take up.”
It would be in the public interest to find alternative sources of energy, he said. ‘‘The concern is the multiplicity in one location.”
Jarboe said, ‘‘In the future we’ll have to make serious concessions to become energy independent.”
Johnson said the system he is getting costs $56,000 new, but he ordered a refurbished one for about half that price.
Proposed zoning amendments must be approved or denied in 125 days.
