Solidarity for struggle against the construction of industrial windpark on the island Samothrace

Only recently it has been brought into the public eye that thirty nine wind generators will be set up in the island of Samothraki. In particular, three and thirty six wind generators respectively are to be built at the Natura sites called Anvil (known as Windville, a not-so-innocent error, as it seems) and Flower, the second tallest peak of mountain Saos. This means that our island is turning into a RES (Renewable Energy Sources) industrial zone overnight. Big investors Bobolas and Kapelouzos, who operate as intermediaries of French and German energy corporate behemoths with dozens of nuclear factories in their home countries plan to destroy beyond repair the primeval and unique natural beauty of our mountain, taking into advantage tailor-made laws passed in 2014 and 2015 in full ignorance of the local community.

In order to fully understand the scale of the disaster, picture this: setting up huge 90 meter tall wind generators entails opening up a road network of 30 and 40 meter roads leading to the peaks, and building concrete bases of one tone and three hundred kilos for every one of them, which means 47 tones of dredging spoils on the mountain tops. In turn, this means total deforestation of the already badly afflicted mountain because of goat overgrazing, since the opening-up of roads will bring upon the danger of illegal logging. When these wind generators cause concrete wounds on the body of the mountain, they will directly cause irreparable damage to the island’s water table (aquifer), as the water won’t be able to penetrate the soil, thus disturbing the entire microclimate of the island.

The mountain springs and the entire water cycle of the island will be severely affected.

To make matters worse, a monstrous network of high voltage pillars will be installed starting from the wind generators site and ending down to the sea. These pillars are pollution and radiation factors and are known to be the typical origin of fire outbreaks.

The story has it that in many areas of Greece, e.g. Apoligadi of Chania the installation of wind generators is the Trojan horse for the creation of hybrid parks after dubious and often suspicious environmental reports which aim at the exploitation of the mountain water resources, as large-profit companies plan to soak up ever energy source of the area. Creating hybrid parks involves wind farms, pump units, hydroelectric power stations with drillings, generally speaking a huge building site.

GREEN GROWTH (OR THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH GOOD INTENTIONS)

It should be made clear that we are all in favour of wind and solar energy and we are deeply concerned that areas like Florina or Ptolemaida are sacrificed daily for lignite production. Yet, the term ‘green growth’ is self-contradictory and misleading by definition. It’s either green or growth. The true meaning behind this term and its distorting mirror is the ever-intensive exploitation of all local resources without taking into account the environmental effect and the local community. No job places will be offered to the local inhabitants, as the crews are all specialized workers from the wind generators country of origin, i.e. Germany and France. Behind their promises lie huge profits at the expense of nature in order to exploit both people and raw material. Their so-called ‘compensatory measures’ only aim at dividing the local community with the policy of ‘divide and rule’, addressing to the existing, pressing economic problems everyone faces. However the ‘earnings’ will be meager compared to the local wealth grabbing which is no other than our mountain, the air we breathe, our sun, our spring pools, natural healing spas, our water. All this will be mortgaged in the name of growth; after the completion of the project we will be left with a ruined land, where every single sector of our local economy –farming, agriculture, tourism, commerce- will be destroyed for good.

All this is no alarmism but a picture from the near future. On the other end of this pointless and extensive energy production, we struggle even at this very moment for environmental reports and the installation of RES which will cover the energy demands of the island with small units per village and friendly energy sources that respect the nature, birds, animals and vegetation, cause no sound or visual pollution, advertise and promote our island, preserve and protect it so that we can hand it down to the next generations in a better state than we inherited it and not as an Eldorado RES.

Please spread the word and support our goal

Local Initiative against the Installation of Wind farms

SOSSamothraki facebook group

Solidarity for struggle against the construction of industrial windpark on the island Samothrace

The main reason for this group is to support the struggle of the local society of Samothraki and give solidarity from abroad, With publication of interviews,. articles, video’s and updates from other sources we aim to unite islanders against the construction of this windpark and against the dirty politics of big companies in general,

Secondly we shed light on potential answers that could help the island community to become more automous.. By organisating community network we’re planning to inform and activate locals to become more automous.,
This in contrast with the desire and strategy of companies to penetrate the community for the purpose of conquest, encroachment and further capitalization and draining of resources which will be a destruction of the natural environment that violates the right of people for free natural resources and conservation .