Present: Tom Brahm Guests: Jack Centner

Zoning Board of Appeals Meeting August 25, 2010 DRAFT Present: Tom Brahm Guests: Jack Centner Tom Burgie Glenn Dunford Ken Hanvey, Chairman Glenn Steed Sandra Hulbert Joe Polimeni Scott Wohlschlegel The August meeting of the Town of South Bristol Zoning Board of Appeals was called to order at 7:30 P.M. followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. A roll call of board members was taken. All board members were present except Tom Brahm who arrived at 7:38 P.M. Chairman Hanvey called for a motion to approve the July 28, 2010 minutes as written. Joe Polimeni made said motion which was seconded by Scott Wohlschlegel. The motion was unanimously accepted. Old Business Town Code Text Amendment-Special Use Permits (Update)- It was called to the board s attention that special use permits should be officially transferred from the Town Planning Board to the Zoning Board of Appeals in early September. New Business PUBLIC HEARING-WINDTAMER TURBINES-REQUEST FOR SETBACK VARIANCE-Before proceeding with the Windtamer application, Tom Burgie relayed the ZBA rules of order for those present. He explained that the board was the applicant s friends and neighbors and as such they would grant relief whenever reasonably possible. Tom said that the board needed to balance the needs and the wants of the applicant if granting the variance against the potential detriment to the community at large. He also said that, by statute, the board must only grant the minimum variance it deemed necessary while at the same time preserving the general character of the neighborhood. Tom said that the board may, at its discretion, impose reasonable conditions that are directly related to and incidental to the proposed use of the property. Chairman Hanvey then read the Legal Notice as published. Okay, at this point, I would like to invite the applicant to come up and give us their take on what they are trying to do and why there is a problem with the setback according to town code. Mr. Steed: My name is Glenn Steed. I am with Windtamer Turbines. I am the installation coordinator and I am also here with Glenn Dunford, the property owner. We are requesting a variance for the wind energy structure on Glenn s property.

2 Basically, we are looking for a decrease in the setback required by town code. On Mr. Dunford s property the location that we have chosen for the Windtamer really has a number of different factors come into play. His lot, though the map does not show it as well as I would like it to, is actually a heavily wooded lot. Of primary importance to Windtamer is making sure that installing the unit is actually going to give him some performance. So if you look at the property there is a very narrow area that falls into play that would actually not be right near the woods itself so that is the siting on this location. The other thing that comes into play is that he does have an existing gravel driveway that comes up to his house from Sweetgum and he can t go any further from the road without starting to interfere with the driveway itself. Additionally, if we go further from the road we are looking at cutting down trees to open up a path to get to the unit itself which we would rather not do as it is a nicely wooded lot and we want to try to keep the natural features as they currently exist without having to modify things too much. The setback that we do have at this proposed location is roughly greater than one and one-half times the unit from the edge of the right-of-way itself. From the road edge, we are two times the height of the unit. The road is a fairly unimproved road. The first time I pulled down there, I have a Subaru, and I thought Well, we ll see how well this goes. I went up there and it is a fairly unimproved road and, I believe it is a private road. Mr. Dunford and his neighbor across the street maintain it. It is actually a 50 foot right of way. Mr. Steed: So, again, the reason for requesting a variance is to try to find the ideal balance for the Windtamer for capturing wind and also so as not to have to modify the existing property in terms of taking down trees or moving a driveway or anything of that sort. I don t know if you can tell from the photos I took but it is heavily wooded and you would not see the Windtamer itself from the neighbor s property and I would say that you would not see it from the road directly across from it. You might see it coming up through the firs somewhere but that is about it. We are trying to get it as far from the road as possible while still maintaining the performance of the unit itself. My understanding of the maximum height of the unit is 38 feet. Mr. Steed: The maximum height of the unit will be 39 feet but it will be less than that. More than likely, we are going to be in the 37 foot range. The difference in height is due to the poles that we get. We order our steel and it comes in about a two foot range (within two feet of each other). For the most part, all the poles that we order are about a foot and a half shorter than what we spec out so it will be closer to 37 feet. Mr. Wohlschlegel: Mr. Steed: Mr. Wohlschlegel: So it will be roughly around 38 feet? Yes, that s about right. And you will need 76 feet from the right-of-way?

3 Mr. Steed: From the edge of the right-of-way, correct. With what we are proposing, we would be 63 feet. So you would need a 13 foot variance. What do you think the chances are of this thing coming in at 39 feet when you order it? Mr. Steed: I would say impossible. It won t be 39 feet. It will be less than that. Thirty-nine feet is spec d. For this we have to have a pole that is probably 3 feet longer than what they have in stock. putting up. Mr. Wohlschlegel: the pole? I just want to be sure to the variance will qualify for what you are So that is the total height counting the fan or is that just counting Mr. Steed: That is the total height of the entire unit. The blades will actually be below that. The front of the unit is the narrow end and then the rear of the unit is where it fans out. The other thing, for myself, that I have leeway with in height are the footers. The specs on this one, I believe, is around a maximum of 3 feet. I can sink that down a little more into the ground. than 38 feet? Mr. Steed: You can basically guaranty that this thing is not going to be more I can guaranty that. So the 76 feet is a good number and working backwards we can get to where we ve got to be. Just out of curiosity, will that shroud prevent any ice throw? Mr. Steed: It actually prevents any ice build up at all. The blades are enclosed within all of that. The blades are set back, in this unit, from one foot to 16 inches in the unit from the front. So they are in there pretty far. The only time you might see any ice buildup on that would be if we had one of these ice storms with real heavy winds that would blow into it. But the unit is going to be spinning and it is going to sling any of that off. One of the things that we really tried to do with the Windtamer design was to include some added safety benefits to the wind energy with ice and blade throw. You don t experience any of that. If you were to have a blade failure for some reason it would rattle around in there and jam the unit up and it would stop. It cannot throw it out of the unit. So there is that added benefit. We were able to have it a little lower to the ground because of the efficiency of the unit. One of the reasons for that is, yeah, it would be great to be 60, 80, 90 feet up in the air but it also makes all of our jobs that much more difficult to do that. What we are really trying to do is find a balance where we can provide wind energy to customers and be a little kinder to everyone around so the

4 neighbors aren t as impacted by an individual wanting to take part in some sustainable wind energy. I see in your letter here that no noise is generated by this thing. Mr. Steed: That is correct. We have had some sound studies done. The Town of Ontario actually requested a sound study. So we did that. We had an engineering firm take care of that for us. What we found from that was basically that as wind speed increases, you have an increase in the ambient noise, the wind blowing off the trees and around structures and things of that nature. The noise coming from the Windtamer itself increases at about the same rate. The greatest difference we found of our unit over the ambient was around 8 decibels and that is just getting into the range where our ears can hear something. We don t really hear anything that is around 8 decibels. So it is really quiet. I usually tell folks that it is going to sound about like your refrigerator running in the house. It really is quiet. Mr. Burgie: How about as the bearing goes out? This is running on bearings, I assume. Do you have any problem with failure modes causing noise problems? Mr. Steed: We don t. Really there are two, what I would consider wear items in the entire structure. There is the generator itself and then there is the bearing stanchion that the whole top sits on and spins on. The generator itself is a high quality generator designed for a 20 plus year life span. This particular generator, once you get into a larger unit, it s a steel sleeve. This unit has a smaller generator and it is pretty light. To change one of them, it is pretty simple. One guy can do it. There is a bearing in there. But, again, it has a 20 year life span. The generator itself is going to stop producing electricity efficiently before anything else wears out on it. Mr. Burgie: I was really considering more the blades as they spin have to be on a shaft that is supported by bearings. What kind of rotation rate are you looking at? Mr. Steed: The blades themselves are actually directly on the generator shaft. There is no gearing or anything like that. We ve tried to keep it as simple as possible so we don t have a lot of maintenance issues. With the Windtamer we are using a nine blade hub on these. The number of blades actually allows us to produce greater electricity at a lower rpm with a slightly larger generator. We have essentially more torque coming in there from the wind. So that helps keep the rpm s down and keeps the bearings from heating up just out of general practice. The engineers are saying that it going to help prolong the life of everything. The other wear item we have on the unit is the bearing stanchion itself because everything sits on top of that pole on a bearing. It is high quality and it comes out of a shop up in Rochester and it is a sealed unit. We put greased fittings on it, not that we plan on using them, but now we have them. So all of our bearings are greaseable. It is a sealed unit so we have not had to do so. But if, over time, there is an issue we can get up there and give it a couple of squirts of grease. We re not looking at having to take the whole unit off and switching the bearings.

5 Jack, one of the things I came up with here in reading the code, it says for setbacks that they shall be two times the maximum structure height or 1 ¼ times the maximum engineer-calculated ice or blade throw distance to the maximum point of impact which is not a problem with this one so we are back to two times the structure height. When you measure from the right-of-way to where this is, what are you measuring to? In order words, is it to the middle of the caisson, the edge of the turbine shroud, or what? Mr.Centner: I guess it would probably be to the center of the pole. I guess it would be up to the board to decide since it is not specified. Mr. Centner: We will assume that it is being measured to the center of the pole. That s good. I just wanted to make sure it wasn t somewhere else in the code because I could not find it in there. Mr. Brahm: Mr. Steed: foundation. Mr. Steed: Is this thing guyed in any way? With guy wires? No, sir. That is one of the reasons for the deeper They are actually digging down below the caisson. It will be 10 foot into the ground. That s not going anywhere. Mr. Steed: To kind of simplify ordering and installations and the future upgrades proposed, we engineered the caisson and the pole for our largest unit but we can put a smaller unit on top as well. So it is extremely over-engineered for the smaller sizes. Anybody else have any questions? Mr. Wohlschlegel: I have one question. You said decibel rating. What is a decibel rating? Do you have information on that? I am looking for a decibel rating from the required setback. Mr. Steed: I would say that from the property line you will never hear it, based on personal experience. I can provide a copy of the sound study that was done. Mr. Wohlschlegel: Could I take a look at that? The code is that it would have to be over 50 decibels. You re saying that they typically operate at about 8?

6 Mr. Steed: Over the ambient, yeah. Ms. Hulbert: I drove down that road and no matter what sound it makes; there isn t anybody who s going to hear it. I was quite surprised and I struggled to turn around in that last camp. Then I think it was Dirk who saw me and I talked to him. He was wondering what I was doing back there. Mr. Steed: With regard to the sound, just as a note, I am sure it is not in there, from experience in the field and being around these, the noise that you hear from it is really going to be out the rear of the unit. If we look at the property and the location of the property and we look at prevailing winds this thing is going to be facing west which puts the rear of the unit actually facing the woods on the Dunford s property. The chances of this thing, with the rear of it facing the road or the neighbor s property, I m not going to say are impossible, but they are pretty darn slim because that it where the all the big woods are. Yeah, you ve got it pretty well narrowed down. Mr. Wohlschlegel: So in trying to understand the sound study here, it has quiet under comment. How do I know that it references a truck, plane, traffic, birds, etc. I m looking at the speed of the wind and then I see the decibel reading here. Mr. Steed: This decibel here you see increase, wind speed was 1.6 mph showing 39.6 decibels. A truck drove by while they were recording and they showed an increase up to 58.4 decibels at that point. Mr. Wohlschlegel: Then they had a wind speed of 8.1 that was 46. That s at 50 feet. So at 100 feet you are about 44 decibels so it is under the 50 decibels. Mr. Steed: With regard to decibels and measurement, let s say at 6.7 mph we are at 39.6, then let s just say that this 8.1 mph is the same wind speed, so operating we are now showing 46.3 so we are roughly 7 decibels over ambient. If we are going to take just the decibel measurement of the unit, I think it is important to consider ambient because ambient is the white noise. The unit is actually adding 7 decibels to what you are hearing. Jack, there was no problem with the decibel level on this, right? We are not here for a variance for that. Mr. Centner: Mr. Wohlschlegel: No. Just for the setback. I just happened to see it and we must consider all of the sections. Any other questions? (None)

7 Mr. Steed: his neighbors. I also would like to note that Mr. Dunford has a letter from one of Yes. I will read that into the minutes a little later. Jack, do you want to do your spiel as to why you had to send this to us? Mr. Centner: The setback needs to be 76 feet where they are proposing 63 feet so they need a 13 foot setback variance. I did receive one phone call from a woman on one of the adjacent properties that was notified. When I explained to her that it was going to be 38 feet high and that it appears from any information that I have that the chances are that it is not going to fall over but in the event it did there would be 25 feet to the property line. She was satisfied with that and she is not here tonight. I think she was envisioning something very tall. Visitation reports? Ms. Hulbert: Yes, I went to the site and once you are down that road you are committed. I talked to Dirk and he had said that someone else had been there and talked to him, too. I looked around and then tried to find my way out. I did not actually go in there because once I went down the road and I saw all the woods and I got to Mr. Dunford s driveway and saw the house and how it was just surrounded by woods I did not see where there would be any kind of issues. Mr. Burgie: Tom, were you able to get there? I was not able to. I am sorry. I was out of town. I went there. Just like she was saying, the property is pretty well wooded and I don t see where there would be any problem with a 38 foot windmill up in there. Mr. Brahm: I got the same impression as everybody else. It s surrounded by woods. The whole thing is woods and if there is any noise from it, I think the woods are going to take care of it. off. You might see a little bit more in the winter when the leaves are Mr. Wohlschlegel: I was there and I walked up in and I saw where it was staked out. Looking through, you can see the neighbor s house over there. I think with the leaves off the trees they would be able to see it from their place but it sounds like they are the ones that wrote the letter stating that they did not have a problem with it. So it sounds like that is covered. From a residential standpoint, there are not a whole lot of people up in there. Then there is a guy further east up toward the gate going back to the hunting camp and he seemed okay with it also and he would not even see it from up there. So I do agree that you have a slot there for wind that come in and if you move it further to the south you are

8 going to be in the driveway toward the cabin and it will interrupt the flow of traffic to the place. You could probably move it a little bit but 13 feet is going to take you in your driveway. I made a phone call to Glenn ahead of time and he was not enough to come down, actually they were both nice enough to come down, and meet me there. I took the afternoon off Friday. Looking at the pictures and stuff like that it seemed like there was a lot more room to work with. Really, once you get in there, it is pretty tight. The trees are a lot closer than they seem. The spot where they have got it marked out really seemed to be, if you stood there and looked out toward the direction where you would want the wind coming in, that is kind of that opening there, trees on both sides, and it is pretty much on the edge of the driveway. It seemed to me that pretty much what they have stated when they put their application in as to reasoning why they wanted it where they wanted it, I did not find any fault with what they had written down. Anybody else have something to say from their visits? (No One) Scott, do you want to give us the SEQR? Mr. Wohlschlegel: Yes. Under SEQR, Section 617.5(c), the following Type II actions are not subject to review under this part, Item (12), the granting of individual setback and lot line variances. So no further action is required. Can I get a motion that we make that Finding #1? Ms. Hulbert: I ll make that motion. I ll second it. Motion was made by Joe Polimeni and seconded by Sandra Hulbert. All in favor, say Aye. All Aye. At this point in time, I would like to open the public hearing portion of the meeting. (Time: 8:15 P.M.) We have already heard from the applicants. I would like to have it noted that at this time they are the only two people present. Therefore, I will now close the public hearing portion of the meeting. (Time: 8:16 P.M.) One thing I would like to do is read the letter received from the neighbors right across the road as follows: August 23, 2010 Dirk and Cheryl Betts 5961 Gulick Road Honeoye, NY 14471 Town of South Bristol Naples, NY 14512 Re: Glenn Dunford

9 To Whom It May Concern: It has come to our attention that our neighbor, Glenn Dunford, would like to install a Windtamer Turbine on his property. We understand what is involved in this process and do not oppose the placement of this turbine. As Glenn s neighbors, we are okay with his going ahead with this project. Thank you. Sincerely, Dirk and Cheryl Betts At this time I would like to open up the discussion and debate period. Does anybody have any misgivings to this project or feel unclear what it is we are trying to do here? (No One) When I think of rural areas, I am pretty sure the picture of this driveway is in the dictionary. It is basically a private right-of-way. My driveway is wider than this road. It goes back in quite a ways off of Gulick Road. It is a fairly densely wooded area. I was kind of concerned a little bit about the visual impact for the neighbors might be a problem. Obviously, they have sent us a letter saying it really isn t too much of a problem. I did look at the trees between the road and the house. There are some pine trees in there so even in the wintertime you are going to have some kind of a blocking effect. I personally did not see where reducing the setback by 13 feet is really going to have very much of an effect on anything as far as causing visual problems, noise problems or anything like that. Does anybody have anything further to say? (No One) The next thing we need to do then is to come up with some findings. Mr. Wohlschlegel: I ve got a couple here. First, investigation indicates that moving the turbine another 13 feet puts the unit in the property owner s driveway which would inhibit the use of the driveway. I would like to make a motion that we accept that as Finding #2. Mr. Brahm: I ll second it. Motion was made by Scott Wohlschlegel and seconded by Tom Brahm. All in favor, say Aye. All Aye. Mr. Wohlschlegel: Investigation also indicates that the tower can be seen by the next door neighbors to the north of your property albeit a letter was written by those neighbors stating that it is okay with them.

10 Okay. Maybe we could say that the nearest neighbor, upon which the proposed project will have the most impact, has sent a letter indicating that it is not a concern. Mr. Brahm: I make a motion to make that Finding #3. Ms. Hulbert: I will second it. Motion was made by Tom Brahm and seconded by Sandra Hulbert. All in favor, say Aye. All Aye. and quite acceptable. The visual impact on the neighborhood, in general, will be minimal Mr. Wohlschlegel: I make a motion to make that Finding #4. Ms. Hulbert: I ll second that. Motion was made by Scott Wohlschlegel and seconded by Sandra Hulbert. All in favor, say Aye. All Aye. I would like to point out that the situation is self-created because, obviously, you want to build the windmill. The need for a variance is a self-created problem. I make a motion that we make that Finding #5. Mr. Wohlschlegel: I ll second it. Motion was made by Joe Polimeni and seconded by Scott Wohlschlegel. All in favor, say Aye. All Aye. Also, as Finding #6 I would like to propose that we say that no one showed up at the meeting to show opposition to the variance. Mr. Brahm: I ll make a motion that we make that Finding #6. Second. Motion was made by Tom Brahm and seconded by Joe Polimeni. All in favor, say Aye. All Aye. I would also say for Finding #7 that the variance requested is not substantial. We have a total required setback of 78 feet and the applicant is asking to reduce that by 13 feet. On a percentage basis, I don t believe that would be considered a substantial variance. Mr. Wohlschlegel: I make a motion that we accept that as Finding #7. Mr. Brahm: Second.

11 Motion was made by Scott Wohlschlegel and seconded by Tom Brahm. All in favor, say Aye. All Aye. Anyone else? Ms. Hulbert: We reviewed the possibility of the noise level. Mr. Wohlschlegel: Why don t we say that after review of the windmill decibel statistics manual information indicates that it falls below the 58 decibel requirement? So, basically, the information presented shows that the unit operates below the 58 decibel level required by town code. Mr. Wohlschlegel: I ll make a motion that we make that Finding #8. Mr. Brahm: I ll second it. Motion was made by Scott Wohlschlegel and seconded by Tom Brahm. All those in favor, say Aye. All Aye. It is in such a rural, heavily wooded area with few people around, it is believed that the windmill will not have any adverse impact on the physical or environmental conditions in the neighborhood. Mr. Wohlschlegel: I make a motion to accept that as Finding #9. Ms. Hulbert: I will second it. Motion was made by Scott Wohlschlegel and seconded by Sandra Hulbert. All those in favor, say Aye. All Aye. Anybody else? (No one) At this point, we need someone to make a motion whether to grant or deny the application for variance. I make a motion that we grant the requested variance. Let s fine tune that a little bit. The motion would be to grant the request for a setback variance which is a reduction from the required 76 feet from the right-of-way to 63 feet measured to the center of the post from the right-of-way for Application #10-038Z. Ms. Hulbert: call vote: I ll second the motion. I made the motion which was seconded by Sandra Hulbert. Roll Sandra Hulbert (Alternate #1)- Aye Joe Polimeni - Aye Tom Burgie (Alternate #2) - Not Voting Ken Hanvey - Aye

12 Tom Brahm Scott Wohlschlegel - Aye - Aye Mr. Dunford: The motion has carried and you have your variance. Thank you. It is my understanding that the Planning Board will be bringing this up for site plan review at their next meeting, I believe, and if everything goes right as far as the timing of the switch of special use permits from the Planning Board to the Zoning Board, we will be looking at this at our September 22 meeting to consider the special use permit. Other Business To Come Before The Board There was no other business to come before the board. Joe Polimeni then made a motion to adjourn which was seconded by Scott Wohlschlegel. The motion was unanimously accepted and the meeting adjourned at 8:30 P.M. Respectfully submitted, Debra Minute Recording Secretary