The City Council will consider a bill Monday to standardize wind-turbine installation on rooftops as part of a suite of green legislation wending its way through the chamber.
Currently, anyone who wants a turbine must apply for a special permit from the Department of Buildings, which is notorious for bureaucracy.
"As anyone who's dealt with [the department] knows, even the most garden-variety projects can often ensnare you in endless strands of red tape," Councilman Costa Constantinides, a Queens Democrat and sponsor of the bill, said in a speech earlier this year. "When you add cutting-edge technology on top of that, you're only complicating it further."
The legislation would standardize the process so property owners would know exactly what to do and inspectors would use the same set of criteria to judge every project. The idea is to help make the city more energy-efficient.
A complementary Constantinides bill would require officials to create a wind map showing where these devices would work best.
Solar panels tend to be more cost-effective small-scale power generators, but not all rooftops are conducive to their installation, creating an opportunity for wind.
Small wind turbines can be used to generate modest amounts of power as well as make a statement about renewable energy, but they are nowhere near the top of the list in terms of potential to make the city greener. Reducing power consumption of buildings, which account for nearly three-quarters of the city's greenhouse-gas emissions, provides the biggest payoff. Large-scale wind farms can also move the needle; the state's Energy Research and Development Authority is working on a plan for turbines off the coast of Long Island.
7 comments:
How about the crooked-and-corrupt council honor their contract with We, the People, instead of hanging up the telephone on us, hiring 'friends & family' for their city, taxpayer funded payrolls, and showing respect and courtesy for the ever languishing constituency for whom they ignore with impunity?
Worse, I am paying for a salary of nearly $170,000 that even my own nephew doesn't make as a top CPA (what qualifications do two grubby, corporate obedient shitheads like Eric Ulrich and Stacey Amato Pfeffer have, aside from low voter turnout for the former, and Pfeffer's own parasitic mother being a worthless slug in the chain of dynastic political power for the latter)?
I am sick to death of paying taxes for hustling political hacks 'n henchmen. When is the power going to be finally restored to We, the People? When is taxation going to follow REPRESENTATION?
>Reducing power consumption of buildings, which account for nearly three-quarters of the city's greenhouse-gas emissions, provides the biggest payoff.
How do they want to do that?
Speaking of hot air...the city council blows enough of it to drive a rank of turbines. Harness their power to generate electricity!
Thats the end of all the pidgions and some birds
These will cause noise and kill many birds !
How many birds does this kill in cities that already have it? City birds aren't flying topspeed close to rooftops.
I know how we can save energy... collect all the BS that comes from The Council (how they refer to themselves, t is capitalized) and burn it’s fuel... the green elite s thrust more legislation that we the people will pay for... SHAME
Post a Comment