Wind farms on land

Ramon Casha

Aug 10th 2008, 05:48

I tend to agree. I don't find, say, the windmills of Holland to be unattractive, nor our wind-operated water pumps ("raddiena"). To be sure, a wind farm will at first be a novelty on the landscape but I don't think that in and of themselves they are unattractive and we'd soon become used to them.

Also - I'm not sure about this, but I don't think they will occupy too much land at the base. They need to be far enough apart for their blades not to touch one another, so they might even be erected on agricultural land without a major impact on the agriculture. Just a few square meters each.

Keith Chircop

Aug 9th 2008, 20:16

Most people don't have the slightest idea of how much land is needed for a wind farm to be feasible.

Yvo Hesselman

Aug 9th 2008, 12:20

If you think windfarms don't spoil the landscape you must be joking! Better make use of the other natural resource, the sun. And the government will have to do something shortly because of the deadline set by the EU.

Ray Arpa

Aug 9th 2008, 12:15

I prefer offshore wind farms notwithstanding the additional costs for the following reasons.
1) Malta is a very small island country with the third highest population density in the world, hense land is limited and needed .
2) Noise polution is another reason why offshore wind farms are preferred.
3) It can be done, As an example,Offshore Copenhagen, Denmark.
4) At sea the wind is even better therefore better performance.

Having stated the above, I wonder how serious the malta government when stating his policy in alternative energy. The lack of critisism from the opposition is even more distturbing.

May I ask the break down disribution of wealth of such commodity, including agents and representatives of imported oil??

Martin Büttner

Aug 9th 2008, 11:48

The government and the parliamentary opposition have proven several times that they are both against alternative energy. Knowing that off-shore windfarms are impossible to erect within the next 10 years (as the technology for deep waters does not exist yet) the government proposes this idea to show their concern about the energy issue. The arguments against on-shore wind farms are obvious excuses. Spoiling the landscape and such wind farms not being feasable have absolutely no weight in my opinion, because they are just not true. Do we know what arrangements have been made between PN and MLP officials and the big friend from Northern Africa? Who earns how much from the oil business? What do we know about the real stakeholders of Enemalta?
Energy is getting more and more expensive. We all have to pay a very high price. The politicians just laugh about it. They can afford the 95% surcharge. The question is: WHY?

Manuel Mifsud

Aug 9th 2008, 10:46

I have a strange feeling that the authorities are not keen to invest funds in alternative energy derived from wind farms. The main argument now is that these wind farms would spoil our landscape. I am convinced that if "state of the art" wind farms were produced which would even enhance our landscape, the authorities would rush to inform us that these would be too expensive! One way or another we are being prevented from making use of this natural resource (wind) which is abundant in the Maltese Islands.

J.Azzopardi

Aug 9th 2008, 10:24

I hope you don't mean the garigue areas.