Arguments Against Shovel Creek Wind Project Are Flawed
By Eric Troyer
February 13, 2024
Editor’s Note: The following piece originally was published as a Community Perspective in the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner on February 4, 2024 and appears here with the author’s permission. It was written in response to an earlier Community Perspective by Kenneth Barrick published in the News-Miner on January 21 (this piece is behind a pay wall).
Mr. Troyer is a writer and former newspaper journalist living in Fairbanks.
The Shovel Creek Wind Project is a proposed 100-210 megawatt wind farm to be built in the Murphy Dome area northwest of Fairbanks. The project would be built, owned, and operated by Alaska Renewables and would sell power to Golden Valley Electric Association (GVEA) and possibly other Railbelt utilities. More information about the project, including a link to virtual community meeting Alaska Renewables hosted in December 2023 can be found here.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not reflect the views of the Alaska Energy Transparency Project or its funders.
I am disappointed with Kenneth Barrick’s recent critical Community Perspective regarding the Shovel Creek wind farm (http://tinyurl.com/289r9jza).
He has impressive credentials. He created the University of Alaska Fairbanks’ environmental studies program and taught environmental studies and resource management at UAF for 30 years. But his arguments did not convince me.
So far, I have been in favor of the wind farm project, but only if it performs as advertised. I certainly don’t want a huge boondoggle destroying the Murphy Dome area landscape. But I also firmly believe we need to reduce our use of fossil fuels to help reduce our impact on climate change.
Barrick has many years of experience in a related field, so I assumed he would have a knowledgeable opinion. Unfortunately, most of his arguments are faulty or incomplete.
Here’s one: “GVEA does not need to approve Shovel Creek Wind to accomplish its goals. Delta is a more appropriate location away from the Fairbanks suburbs and recreational activities near Murphy Dome.”
The Delta Junction proposal will generate 36 megawatts of power while the Shovel Creek project would generate 100 megawatts of power (http://tinyurl.com/3xzfxxbc). Right now, GVEA can produce just over 400 megawatts of power, almost all of that with fossil fuels. Only about 45 megawatts are from non-fossil fuel sources (http://tinyurl.com/c6huke3x). Clearly, if we are going to reduce our fossil fuel dependence, we need more alternative energy than both the Delta Junction and Shovel Creek projects combined. Barrick’s argument that the Delta Junction project would be sufficient falls flat.
Another argument: “A million birds and bats are destroyed each year by wind turbines, and our bird populations will not be immune from these impacts.”
Barrick doesn’t put those numbers into perspective. This study (http://tinyurl.com/2a7ctpct) estimates the total birds killed each year by human-caused sources at 500 million to 1 billion. Sibley, a company that makes birding guides, has a chart based on 2017 US Fish and Wildlife Service data. In it, wind turbines are last out of nine of human-caused dangers to birds (http://tinyurl.com/yevxcff2). As wind turbine numbers increase, the danger will increase, but turbines clearly have a long way to go to be a serious threat.
Barrick also doesn’t discuss the how climate change will affect bird populations. Scientists predict that many animal populations will decline and even die off due to climate change (http://tinyurl.com/5h4ucp7d). It’s not a stretch to claim that if we do nothing about climate change far more birds will die.
Barrick also offers this bizarre factoid: “Did you know that Alaska’s boreal forest is home to six species of bats?”
According to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, Alaska has seven documented bat species, all but one are found only in Southeast Alaska (http://tinyurl.com/mtv674er).
The little brown bat has been documented in Interior Alaska, but only rarely (http://tinyurl.com/3z2hk2ws). Bats should not be a serious part of an argument about Interior wind farms.
Another factoid: “Moreover, about 120 wind turbines fail and catch fire each year sending plumes of flame and molten metal to the ground.”
This is a concern, but again perspective is needed. Studies vary, but wind turbine fires appear to happen at a rate of anywhere from 1 per 2,000 a year to 1 per 7,000 (http://tinyurl.com/2kb6ps4y). And again, we must weigh that against the increased wildfire due climate change.
Barrick closes with some strange logic. It boils down to this: Wind farms are subsidized by federal grants, which contribute to the federal debt, which fuels inflation, making the costs of wind farm “unknowable.”
That’s a huge leap of logic. National economics are incredibly complex. I’m no economist, but Barrick isn’t either. Unless he can back his argument up with some solid data, it should be tossed.
Barrick’s opinion piece is extremely disappointing. He brings up valid points but fails to put them in perspective. Doing so greatly diminishes their power. Mostly, he doesn’t explain what we can do instead of the Shovel Creek project to reduce our fossil fuel use.
Bernie Karl has been working for years on geothermal power generation, but it is still not working on a large scale. GVEA’s one solar farm generates about one-half of a megawatt of power. The Susitna River dam, if it ever happens, is years and years away from generating power.
Allowing the Shovel Creek project in the Murphy Dome area is a sacrifice. But we aren’t going to reduce our climate change impacts without sacrifice. If the Shovel Creek project passes muster with the GVEA Board of Directors and the local state and federal agencies, I support it.
However you feel, please let the GVEA Board know: http://tinyurl.com/38btx8zn