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"If every single one of us would go by the old saying 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you,' (it) wouldn't be necessary for any ordinance to ever be drawn up - but life isn't that way," Supervisor Chairman Les Wachob said.
The supervisors have looked at sample ordinances from other townships that have dealt with windmills and will scour them for the best elements to suit the township's needs.
"Iberdrola Renewables is the world's largest wind energy company. We have thousands of wind turbines throughout the world, and we are very careful about where we put them because wind energy only works over the long term," Craig Poff of Iberdrola said. "If a community wants a wind farm, a wind farm will happen. If the community doesn't want a wind farm, it will never happen, despite any effort I or any other wind energy company can make."
Poff said setbacks are key to successful integration of wind farms into a community. The PA Wind Model suggests a 500-foot setback from occupied building but Iberdrola Renewables prefers to have a setback of 1,000 feet or more.
"There is a fine line between reasonableness and unfeasibility," Poff said. "Based on the way the homes are distributed across the landscape, if you used more than 1,250 as a setback, you wouldn't have anything left to put a wind turbine on in Brady Township."
Setbacks of 1,250 feet would make a limited amount of area in the southeastern part of the township available for wind development. Poff said the Clover Run wind project would put 70 megawatts of power, or 35 wind turbines, in the area and only a portion are located in Brady Township.
Township resident Glenn Schuckers said 1,200 feet is about four football fields end-to-end.
Resident Sharon Gilmore said while green energy is "in style" and "essential" so the masses aren't dependent on fossil fuels, she is most concerned about the potential health issues associated with them. She said she isn't against windmills, but would prefer to see them have a 2-kilometer setback, which is more than 10,500 feet.
Schuckers described a recent visit to the dairy farm of Bob Wills in Somerset County. He saw crops growing, cattle grazing and life on the farm going as usual with turbines spinning in the background. Wills told him after the initial scare of construction, wild animals came back to the area as they were before the windmills were put in.
Schuckers said that during the tour they stopped and talked under the turbines and also at about 1,000 feet from them, where Wills' dwellings were situated. In both spots, Schuckers couldn't hear noise from them.
"The problem with turbines seems to be - not the audible - but the frequencies below audible, like the dog whistle on the lower scale," resident Gary Gilmore said. "Those seem to be associated with the wind syndrome problem like the irritability."
"We're not here to eliminate it, we're just here to strike a balance so people who aren't interested or who haven't been asked to get a wind turbine on their property can live equitably, peacefully and healthfully," Sharon Gilmore said. "I'm basing my setback suggestion on studies I've read, I don't know where the company has come up with theirs - it almost sounds capricious."
Gary Gilmore asked Poff if Iberdrola performs studies to test the effects of shadow flickering, which can be caused by the sun shining through the moving blades of a windmill and onto a nearby home.
Poff said while the testing of every home isn't policy, if a resident makes a reasonable request such as having the company look at the potential effects flickering could have, Iberdola would definitely look into it.
Resident Tom Allison said he has found information on wind turbine noise that explains the turbines that caused noise were downwind turbines with fixed blades. Now, industrial sized turbines made in the U.S. are upwind vertical access towers in which the blades rotate to eliminate the sound.
"I'm working hard to restore a farm that I want to leave to my daughter and my granddaughter. I want to leave something to my children - everybody in here probably does," Allison said. "Wind power is cheap. They are offering to be a good neighbor and set the distance back more than double what the Pennsylvania Model says. In the long run, it (wind) is a cheap alternative to where gas prices are going to go in the future."
Resident David Miller said he has a gas compressor on his property that runs 24-hours-a-day, seven-days-a-week and he said he'd take the "whoosh" of a windmill over that sound any day.
"It's going to help the economy. It's going to make work," Miller said. "With the way everything is right now, why would somebody want to stop it, that's my opinion."
Schuckers said if eight windmills are placed on the property of the 25 residents who have been asked by Iberdrola to participate in the wind farm, over 10 years they will make $1 million.
When the supervisors asked Poff what the tax assessment rate is on the windmills, he said he is unsure and would bring them back the information.
"I will emphasize this again, we cannot hold a business from coming into your township or municipality, and that's in your paperwork, Sharon," Supervisor Darryl Beatty said. "You have to figure out what is fair to them and fair to you. The bottom line is that we have to find out what is fair for everybody."
Some residents, like Charlie Hayes, said the wind turbine is an evolution in technology which has the ability to do good and harm for Brady Township. It is similar to when the first train came through, the first airplane flew overhead or when the first mine was dug - the people of Brady just need to learn how to adapt, Hayes said.
"I've had headaches, irritability and nosebleeds when gas prices were $4 per gallon last year, and you can say the same thing about a wind turbine and they're offering to set it back 1,250 feet instead of 500 feet," Allison said. "You have a company, who to me sounds like they are trying to do the right thing and bring some profitability into the area in addition to what it already has, and at the same time, vie for a greener future for our kids. If everyone in here wants to pay $11 per gallon for home heating oil and gas, because eventually we're going to be there."
Other considerations include permitting fees and a permitting process for potential wind farm applicants, severability clauses, consideration of how private windmills fit into or won't be regulated under the ordinance and what rights the township has to collect for the wear-and-tear on its roads.
"We need something," Wachob said. "Nothing is worth nothing."
