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April 7, 2011

Highland wind farm gets tougher scrutiny

By The Mainebiz News Staff

The Land Use Regulation Commission has decided to more thoroughly review a proposed 39-turbine wind farm in Highland Plantation to ensure it won't adversely impact the region's scenic character.

Commissioners yesterday voted to invoke for the first time an exception in Maine law that allows them to scrutinize whether a wind farm's associated facilities, including buildings and generators, will negatively impact scenery in the Somerset County community, according to the Morning Sentinel. Developer Highland Wind LLC, a subsidiary of former Gov. Angus King's Brunswick firm, Independence Wind, will have to prove that the wind farm's facilities, generator lines and access roads will fit into the existing landscape in order to obtain necessary permits. Public hearings on the wind farm are scheduled for late June.

Independence Wind, also co-owned by former Maine Public Broadcasting Corp. Director Robert Gardiner, initially pitched the project in 2009 as a 48-turbine wind farm, but scaled it back in December following opposition from conservation groups. In February, neighboring Pleasant Ridge Plantation denied a permit for transmission lines needed to connect the wind farm to the grid, saying they would be unsightly and the proposed locations did not match the information provided to LURC.

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