The Village of Sharon Springs voted in a six-month moratorium on wind projects Thursday following a discussion that drew mostly questions on regulating natural gas drilling.
Sharon’s Joint Planning Board had asked for the moratorium to give members time to look over their zoning codes and see where they might apply to industrial wind turbines, said Chairman Ray Parsons.
“That’s the only reason,” Mr. Parsons said. “We’re not for it or against it and nothing’s being proposed.”
From the audience, Karen Cookson asked if the Planning Board was also going to look at regulating natural gas drilling.
Mr. Parsons said they’d discussed it, but because the state has nothing in place regulating as drilling, planning boards have no authority to regulate it either.
About all they could do, Mr. Parsons said, is regulate road standards in the event they were damaged by drilling traffic.
Cheryl Parsons Reul, the village’s attorney, added public policy seems to be of two minds when it comes to trying to regulate natural gas drilling.
Ms. Reul said she leans more toward giving regulations “a shot.”
Other attorneys, she said, believe regulations could end up carrying no weight.
Resident Ann Adams also pointed out that if the village established a six-month moratorium to look at natural gas drilling and there was still nothing from the state during that time, the village could end up having to extend the moratorium “and that doesn’t look good, either.”
Specifically, the law approved Thursday establishes a six-month moratorium on the “establishment, placement, construction, enlargement or erection of wind energy facilities (windmills) within the Village of Sharon Springs.