Wolfe Island turbines impact property value

In the summer of 2014, area Realtors told the Times that the value of waterfront homes in Cape Vincent slid steeply over the previous five years because of the eyesore of the Wolfe Island Wind Farm

The Watertown daily news has a story that I need to write about, having followed some other events on property values and Wolfe Island wind turbines in the past.

The study’s prediction model was developed by evaluating the impact of the 86-turbine Wolfe Island Wind Farm in Ontario, Canada, on property values in the town of Cape Vincent...
Researchers collected data on the sale of 5,631 residential parcels in Jefferson County from 2009 — when the Wolfe Island wind project became operational — through 2013. That, which served as a baseline, was then compared with 26 residential parcels with a view of turbines that were sold over the same period in Cape Vincent within a five-mile radius of the island. Clarkson students verified that all of those parcels had a view of one or more turbines, said Dr. Martin D. Heintzelman, associate professor of economics and financial studies at Clarkson’s School of Business.
“We compared the 26 transactions to the 5,000 and looked for changes in price across the data,” said Dr. Heintzelman, who led the property value analysis.
The study found that on average, Cape Vincent homes with a view of turbines sold for 15 percent less than homes without a view over the period...

Clear enough.

Now, let's hop in our little Ontario clown boat and sail over to Premier Wynne's Ontario, and the treatment of property values on the very same Wolfe Island.



From John Spears at The Toronto Star - April 28, 2014:

Wind turbines do not have a significant effect on the sale prices of nearby homes, a study by the Municipal Property Assessment Corp. has concluded.
...

“MPAC’s findings also concluded that there is no statistically significant impact on sale prices of residential properties in these market areas resulting from proximity to an IWT, when analyzing sale prices.”

The study includes a separate analysis by an Arizona-based firm. That analysis concluded that the presence of a wind farm has a “statistically significant but minor” impact on property value.

Properties within one kilometre of a turbine suffer a 4-per-cent drop in value, it said.

The MPAC study is unlikely to settle the controversy over wind turbines. Jane Wilson, who heads Wind Concerns Ontario, told the Star the research is flawed.

Wilson said the study used questionable mathematical modelling and excluded properties that simply didn’t sell or were withdrawn from the market because they’re too close to turbines.

“Honestly, if you have a home, and someone puts up a thing that’s equivalent to a 30- or 40-storey tower, that does make noise, that does have flashing red lights — it’s really not a big jump to say that’s going to have some effect on values,” she said.

Wilson pointed to an appendix in the MPAC report containing bar charts showing the relationship between property values and proximity to wind turbines.

She said the charts show that properties five kilometres or more from wind turbines generally have higher sale prices and assessments than those within five kilometres of turbines.

MPAC officially held that turbines are placed where people properties are worth less to begin with.

Wynne's official Ontario appears uniquely capable of not knowing negative impacts of industrial wind.

January 2016 study: Exploring the impact of the proposed Galloo Island energy project