Talk:Waitahora Wind Farm

Stuart Christopher Brown

However passionate you are, Wikipedia is not the venue for your protest actions. Content here must be unbiased and neutral - this is a fundamental Wikimedia principle and a cornerstone of Wikipedia.

• Stuart Brown is reported as leader of opposition group "Waitohora Guardians". Posts by user of this name appear to be spam.Pakaraki (talk) 10:14, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Pakaraki

However commited to power companies you are, Wikipedia is not the venue for you to promote them. As you say content here should be unbiased and neutral.

My posts are not spam.

I am unashamably the deputy leader of the local opposition group, but as I say on the the Wikipedia page the windfarm is clearly opposed by the majority of local residents for very good reasons. Unfortunately for locals we don't get to make the decisions that affect our lives.

• Posts by Pakaraki appear to be spam, if not he/she would give their real name as I have.

Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 21:05, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

From your user page, it appears you are new to Wikipedia. Welcome. Your contributions to improve and expand Wikipedia are encouraged. You should review the five pillars on which it is based. As pointed out by 162.112.38.5 above, contributions should be unbiased and take a neutral point of view. You should also consider if there is a conflict of interest, which can often occur when an editor has strong personal interest in the article subject.

Content must be verifiable. For example, statements that a majority of the public hold a certain view must be referenced to a reliable third party source. By itself, Self published material does not normally qualify as verification.

Thank you for your care when editing Wikipedia articles. Pakaraki (talk) 05:19, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

I've declared why I am interested in this article, now why don't you declare yours? You obviously have an interest in power generation, particularly by Contact Energy, it would contribute to an honest and robust debate if you declared why you are interested in this subject. As to an independant assessment of the degree of local opposition I'm afraid at the moment you'll just have to take my word for it. We would have to employ an independant researcher to do otherwise. We have had this proposal thrust upon us with very little in the way of support to deal with it. They've told us to make submissions, but given us no help to do that. They claim to have done community consultation, but are not interested in what we think about it let alone using that information to change anything, which is what I would have thought is what consultation means. We have to fund our own legal battle and any supporting reports let alone all the time involved in looking through the massive consent and associated reports. Lots of meetings etc also. Contact Energy have been unsympathetic and they havn't provided much of the information we want eg there still has been no visual simulation done from any place along the Waitahora Valley Road (where I live). No one has been given hard copies of any of the documentation, apart from their promotional brochure, which is hardly helpful. You can hardly blame me for taking an opportunity to put something from our side of the case. At least the Contact guys still get paid for their work, we don't. At the end of the day all we are trying to do is preserve the status quo, not make anything new, we certainly won't be making any money, it'll just end up costing us plenty no matter what the outcome. The best we can hope for is some consessions, whereas Contact has the potential for a massive new windfarm and associated profits but it'll cost us plenty either way. In that context can't you see that calling me a spammer is incredibly unfair? Windfarms are also clearly industrial developments, havn't you seen the massive steel towers, concrete plant, earthworks and quarry required? The power companies own submissions say that. Lets be real please.

Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 08:44, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

My interests are outlined on my user page, and I have no particular involvement in this project. However, I do support the Wikipedia principles, and wish to see these applied here. Clearly, you are frustrated with the RMA process as applied to this project and to other wind farms proposed in your area. However, Wikipedia is not an appropriate platform for your protests.

From Let the facts speak for themselves; Karada offered the following advice in the context of the Saddam Hussein article:

You won't even need to say he was evil. That is why the article on Hitler does not start with "Hitler was a bad man" — we don't need to, his deeds convict him a thousand times over. We just list the facts of the Holocaust dispassionately, and the voices of the dead cry out afresh in a way that makes name-calling both pointless and unnecessary. Please do the same: list Saddam's crimes, and cite your sources.

Please consider that readers unfamiliar with this project will probably not be convinced by unsubstantiated claims and opinions. If you do not allow the facts to speak for themselves, you may alienate readers and turn them against your position.

If you are not satisfied with how the council is handling the project, you should take it up with them. Perhaps with the council officers directly, and with the councilors who represent you. They may not even read this article, and even if they did, it wouldn't constitute any part of the RMA process. Pakaraki (talk) 23:06, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't have any problem with facts and evidence, I am a budding scientist in fact. It's not unsubstaintated that there is lot's of opposition to the wind farm. Evidence of that is the lack of a local supporters web site or supportive evidence in newspaper articles. I know of no local supporters, apart from the few people who are directly benefitting and their employees. I admit there are a few who are ambivalent but the overwhelming majority are in opposition.

Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 00:23, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia content must be verifiable. For example, statements that a majority of the public hold a certain view must be referenced to a reliable third party source. By itself, self published material does not normally qualify as verification. Alternatively, the Wikipedia article could state that the opposing groups website states that a majority opposes the project. Pakaraki (talk) 01:41, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Well I'm completely satisified that the majority doesn't support it, that's sufficient for me. 222.155.14.143 (talk) 02:21, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

It is not a matter of whether you or I are satisfied, Wikipedia content must be verifiable. In this case, the suggestion above (the opposing groups website states that a majority opposes the project) is verifiable. Pakaraki (talk) 02:40, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

See below for discussion on sources Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 08:57, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I couldn't see any reason why the consent submission details were removed so I restored them. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 09:26, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Proposed Project Tag

Stuart Christopher Brown and 222.155.14.143 have repeatedly removed the proposed project tag and the location coordinates. Please explain why you have removed this content, as it doesn't seem to be in dispute. If the coordinates are incorrect, please provide correct data. Pakaraki (talk) 02:24, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't know what Proposed Project Tag is or what the coordinates are about? I admire your dedication to research but I think I've explained the local data sufficiently and unless someone is going to fund some independant research it'll have to stay that way. In my opinion it doesn't justify being labelled unverifed. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 09:11, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Users 222.155.14.143 and 222.155.7.65 have repeatedly removed the proposed tag and location coordinates. The proposed tag is there because this is a proposed project, it has not yet been built (and may never be built). The location coordinates are included for information. Please explain why you consider these items should not be included in this article. It is not clear why you consider that this content should be in dispute. Please explain your reasoning. Pakaraki (talk) 07:44, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

It is quite clear in the article that the wind farm has not yet been built. It doesn't need any riders to say that the proposal is speculative. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 08:06, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

The proposed tag categorises the article as relating to a proposed project. This approach has been taken with other projects of this type (hopefully all of them), and enables a reader to cross reference with other such projects. For example, consider these proposed power projects.

There is yet to be any reasoning put forward for deletion of the location coordinates. Pakaraki (talk) 10:08, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Related Issues?

The related issues section of the article appears to be only distantly related to the subject matter of the article. This section refers to formal submissions made by four generating companies (Meridian, Mighty River Power, Genesis and TrustPower), but on reading the Council document, it is clear that none of these is involved in the project that this article addresses. The section then alleges certain intentions to these submissions, but it is misleading to imply this has anything to do with the Contact Energy project.

The section also states that the Council has not provided information to the public about these submissions. This is clearly not the case, as the section references the Council website where the information is provided. There is also reference on the front page of the Council website.

From this, it appears that this section is biased and lacks a neutral point of view. I suggest this section needs to be rewritten to remove bias and include verified sources, or alternatively, it should be moved to a separate article. Pakaraki (talk) 06:18, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

One issue is the potential density of windfarms in the area. An overall plan of how many and where windfarms can be tolerated needs to be done rather than dealing with them one by one so a that a coordinated approach is taken. Another issue is amount and size of the transmission lines that are required. It would be preferable to have only one set of lines coming over from Bunythorpe into the district. Contact have put in their consent application that they may use two 110 kv lines, which would mean they don't need resource consent for transmission lines. Again this is why a coordinated approach is needed.

Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 08:53, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

That's a valid point. It would be good if you could expand the article to include this. Be sure to include a link to verify the Transpower statement. Pakaraki (talk) 09:14, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I've removed the request for a citation in the first paragraph. There is a reference to the community group which covers this issue. The information is clearly verifiable.

In the related issues first paragraph, the reference to power companies trying to change the district plan does not need to include the word other as it is unclear and unnecessary as to what the other is referring to. This is because the article is about the Waitahora Wind farm, not energy companies. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 04:44, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

By itself, Self published material does not normally qualify as verification. Certainly, unsubstantiated claims of an opposition website does not provide robust verification. --Pakaraki (talk) 18:34, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes sure in some situations, but I don't think it applies here. It's actually much more of a community group than an opposition group. We had to form a group because there was no other local vechile apart from the cricket club which is technically in recess, although we still play social games. The Waitahora school closed several years ago so we had to form ourselves into something and an environmental protection group reflects our concerns well. Characterising the group as an opposition group detracts from the issues we are trying to address.

Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 05:33, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Reversion back to my edit

I reverted the page to my edit after Stuart Christopher Brown undid it. I now note form this talk page that there is an ongoing issue with POV and using WP as a campaigning tool. I am a staunch environm,netalist but I adhere to WP policies and try not to "push my environemntal barrow"!. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 21:51, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Revision

No this is not a campaigning tool, it is merely an opportunity to clarify some issues. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 04:45, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Mr Brown, you are welcome to your views opposing this project, but Wikipedia is not the place to advocate them. As I said earlier, complying with Wikipedia principles of neutral POV and independent verification is more likely to convince people. For example, the lack of independent verification of the claim of majority local opposition undermines its credibility. --Pakaraki (talk) 22:46, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Mr Pakaraki, if you read the article again you will notice that there is no longer a reference to a majority. After considering your comments I decided that should be changed so I did so (awhile ago). I'm not saying there isn't a majority in opposition, but that I agree with you that such a claim would need to be verified. There can surely be no dispute that a large proportion of local residents opppose the windfarm because this claim doesn't specify an actual percentage, and clearly a lot of locals oppose it.

Also you may notice that in the article I am not denegrading the proposed Waitahora wind farm, merely providing some additional information and from that perspective I think I write from a neutral POV. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 08:55, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

The submissions on the district plan are called cross submissions rather than counter submissions as they can be in support, I know some were. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 09:21, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

I apologise if I have misrepresented you, and your recent edits have been much more in line with Wikipedia principles. However, the current version of the article claims a "large proportion of local residents", still without verification. This seems to imply a claim of majority support for the opposition group. There is no problem with this if it is the case, it just needs to be verified. Otherwise, reword it to a verifiable statement, such as "local group claims to represent a majority of local residents". --Pakaraki (talk) 18:05, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

That's ok, maybe I got my back up. I've edited it again, hope it's ok. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 18:30, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I've restored the image file. When I uploaded the image I hadn't entered the licensing information, this has now been corrected. Stuart Christopher Brown (talk) 02:37, 16 December 2008 (UTC)