Should taxpayers or rate payers underwright these expense. Traditionally, taxpayers have funded hydro and ratepayers nukes.
If taxpayer funded, who will benefit? Will rate payers enrich service districts or will rates reflect only reasonable maintenance?
If privately funded, will rate payers be subsidized by taxpayers or will the cost be diluted across broad, regulatory regions or will local rate payers simply have to bite the bullet?
The hydro thing gets all bunged up by water battles over who gets the used water. The nuke thing gets all bunged up by mystical fears reminscent of antiquainted panic producing Pagan belief systems.
None of it matters because every human being on earth benefits from water and power... God bless them one and all!!! (and do the opposite to the Born Again Pagan EnvironMentalists)
There is nothing wrong with hydro or nuclear but both have a large initial expense. The question regarding either is who will pay the bill.”
P G & E—Pacific Gas & Electric was in business for years and doing a good job until Grey Davis and the Environazis came along.
There were lawsuits from the enviros and they demanded that P G & E could NOT own the land, own the dams, own the turbines, own the transmission lines, and all of the network that got the power from moving water to your house.
Courts agreed, and made P G & E sell their land and dams all along the western side of the Sierras. Blackouts and greyouts were a daily occurance. Now- another layer of profit center is owning the dams and charging P G & E, and the customer pays more. Still another owns the transmission lines, etc.
The enviros are still demanding that these dams which produce power be torn down-—so the rivers can run free and the fishes can climb to the top of Donner pass if they want to to “spawn”.
All I ever learned about fish and spawning is that they go back to where THEY were born. If they were not born way upriver—they won’t go there.
Meanwhile—no dam= no electricity produced, no water retention for flood protection, no controlled releases which irrigate the millions of acres of farms and ranches in the San Joquin Valley, and which also, provide recreation and fishing while traveling from the dam to the farmer.
Geeeezzz—who knew that those old timers who built the P G & E business into what it was at it’s pre-enviro peak knew so much without a fancy formal education and Al Gore to lead them?????
Millions of dollars of construction being destroyed, flooding imminent ( see 1986 and 1996 in Sacramento area) and no power, and iratic control of irrigation, jeopardizing farmers, ranchers and ordinary citizens food supply???? Delta smelt and swimming pools are more important to the enviros.
Sure sounds like a recipe for disaster to me...