The law on placement was changed in recent years. Originally the French Medical Association produced a report stating that large industrial wind turbines should not be sited within 1.5 km of ANY habitation for health impact reasons.
The government realised that this would restrict turbines to the heights of the Alps, Jura and Pyrenees. Despite being a huge country France’s population is spread fairly well thoughout the countryside. If you draw a 1.5km radius circle on a map of France there is barely anywhere where there is not a house , farm or hamlet within that 1.5 km circle. Even in places like Creuse or Lozere!!
The law was changed to allow large turbines (200 metre high ) as close as 500 metres from a property. Seems the government are going against medical advice. Solar is a much better option. No noise, can’t be seen from ground level.
In our part of France (Correze) we have so many days when there is virtually zero wind, especially in winter. We have a great hydro electricity resource, and personally I believe in micro generation. Fund people to have solar panels, heat pumps, ground source heat pumps. We do not need to be sold energy by huge profit making German corporations such as RWE.
On the basis of your first post, that seems an unlikely possibility…
Personally I find large modern milking parlours such as we get in the Aveyron and Cantal are a far uglier and intrusive visual landscape element, and of course they are often built very close to village houses.
I’ll also reiterate that IMO that in France most terrestrial windfarms are a probably fairly intermediate solution and they can be easily dismantled and recycled.
Certainly not against solar, it makes particular sense in urban environments. Less sure that it’s always a good use of land in arable temperate countryside because 5unlike windfarms) the large footprint limits the site’s ongoing use for agriculture (tho’ perhaps they could provide large shaded areas like forests that would enable more pigs to be raised outdoors).
500 metres is nothing in a landscape as quiet as where our property is. Sound travels and turbines emit a constant whooshing noise when turning. This would be audible at our property. For now the plan has been rejected by the Correze on military grounds, but could be quashed at the appeal court in Bordeaux as the developer has appealed the decision. Let’s see if a German developer (RWE) can defeat the French military!
For the closest turbine they need to build a new railway bridge and a concrete road across a wetland area just to get the blades in. The fact they are prepared to do this demonstrates just how much money there is to be made for the developers. Why not just give every house in our area free solar panels instead?
Sheep and cows are grazed widely on the Plateau Millevaches. I have seen that the solar panels can provide shade for gazing animals so can’t see an issue. They are much less intrusive.
Well by “right next to” I mean’t 500 metres, which is no distance at all to avoid the noise pollution (constant whooshing of the blades though the air) I much prefer the micro generation approach. Give people the means to make their own electricity on their own properties.
Big corporations making huge profits is not the way forward for energy sustainability in my book. RWE don’t give a damn about local communities or our local area, they are just chasing the money, evidenced by the lengths they are prepared to go to to install five turbines in the Parc Naturel Regional Plateau Millevaches. There is no stategic plan for renewable energy in France, just developers chancing their arms on random projects. Correze already has a green energy surplus through hydro electricity.
In all seriousness, one of the survey masts they erected in East Correze (these go up before the turbines get given permission) was felled a year ago, maybe more. Pulled down by a tractor I would think.
Graham Robb’s excellent history, TheDiscovery of France opens in nearby Clairveux d’Aveyron where some unfortunate C18th trig surveyors who were undertaking the first large scale mapping of France were assumed to be evil wizards and were promptly killed by the locals.
Ours too (despite the efforts of neighbouring villages). Our place’s earliest map reference is 1542, but I know the house is at least a century earlier because of its C14th architectural style and it being one of the closest to the protection of the village’s 11th century chateau. Suspect it was built in the late C14th and keep meaning to get dendritic dating from a beam that has been cut through, revealing the growth rings.
