Maine Summits Protected

February 2008: Maine’s land-use regulators have decisively rejected a proposed industrial development atop the largest unbroken, pristine stretch of subalpine summits in Maine outside Baxter State Park—a proposal the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (ATC), the Maine A.T. Club (MATC), and others fought for more than a decade.

In January, the Land Use Regulation commission (LURC) denied an application to erect 18 wind turbines atop Black Nubble Mountain. That application was a scaled-back version of a Maine Mountain Power proposal for a 1,000-acre, 30-turbine complex atop both Black Nubble and nearby Redington that LURC rejected in January 2007. Maine Mountain Power (MMP) is an amalgam of Maine-based Endless Energy Corporation and California utility financiers.

ATC, MATC, the National Park Service, and other opponents—including Maine Audubon, the Appalachian Mountain Club, and the local, grassroots Friends of the Western Maine Mountain—argued that:

  • the development’s roads and construction operations risked high erosion off the steep slopes,
  • clear-cutting and operation of the farm would put the globally rare Bicknell’s thrush and several migratory bird species and bats at risk, and
  • the tight group of whirring, flashing structures higher than 40-story buildings at those locations was an unacceptable eyesore in the face of a national scenic trail.

Nineteen rare or declining species have been found in the Black Nubble area, which has the highest recorded rate of after-dark bird and bat migration in the eastern United States.

The wind farm would have been a prominent element of the view for hikers along more than 33 miles of the A.T. including such classic views as Saddleback Mountain, The Horn, Saddleback Junior, Sugarloaf and The Crockers, since the A.T. arcs around the proposed development area. The full development, MMP said, would have supplied electricity for 33,000 to 44,000 homes—somewhere else in the regional power grid than Maine.

The LURC, a group of citizens appointed by the governor, follows the LURC Comprehensive Land Use Plan which puts the burden of proof on the proponents of developments to demonstrate that they will not have an “undue adverse effect on existing uses, scenic character and natural…resources.” That charter is being examined in the light of alternative-energy developments not anticipated when it was written to govern zoning in Maine’s remote areas.

The Redington/Black Nubble proposal was one of seven wind-farm proposals examined by ATC in recent years for their potential effect on the A.T. experience, and the only one it opposed. Those examinations led the ATC Board of Directors in November 2007 to adopt a policy on wind-energy facilities, not unlike ATC’s longstanding policy on the siting of electric transmission lines across the Trail corridor. One of those other proposals was approved 7-0 by LURC at the same time it voted 4-2 to protect Black Nubble.

 

 

On a related note, ATC submitted comments in November 2007 to the USDA Forest Service on its proposed wind energy directive.