Energy 'Sprawl' and the Green Economy

Wall Street Journal ^ | September 17, 2009 | Lamar Alexander

[libstripper]

Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar recently announced plans to cover 1,000 square miles of land in Nevada, Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah with solar collectors to generate electricity. He's also talking about generating 20% of our electricity from wind. This would require building about 186,000 50-story wind turbines that would cover an area the size of West Virginia not to mention 19,000 new miles of high-voltage transmission lines.

Is the federal government showing any concern about this massive intrusion into the natural landscape? Not at all. I fear we are going to destroy the environment in the name of saving the environment.

[libstripper]

WOW!! My Senator Alexanxder, who's sometimes a bit of a RINO, really hits it out of the park in this op ed.

[Abathar]

Flood that area with shallow water and industrial waste, throw some algae in it and produce oil instead. Wring the oil out of it and throw the waste back in as food for its offspring. Clean, “carbon neutral” and we can use it as a transportable fuel across the nation.

[109ACS]

Nuclear. So easy, even the French can do it.

[TChris]

Nuclear. So easy, even the French can do it.

It's racist of you to like nuclear energy.

[Carley]

IIRC one of CA senators was not amused by this proposal.

She said she didn’t want the beauty of the desert marred by solar panels. That it was environmentally sound planning.

[Oldexpat]

Gang Green and it is spreading.

[o_zarkman44]

Green is the new color of Communism.

Green jobs are ghost jobs nobody actually get.

Only the elites are entitled to a high standard of living.
The people don’t matter.

[libstripper]

Nuclear. So easy, even the French can do it.

Not only that, the Froggies do it so well that they recycle most of their high level waste, avoiding stupidities like perpetual storage of a valuable fuel resource.

[Dixie Yooper]

Not at all. I fear we are going to destroy the environment in the name of saving the environment.

How can anyone even think about the environment when we are faced with the dilemma of World Climate Change???

[hellbender]

I’ve seen wind turbines marring an unspoiled landscape near where I live. They are gross visual pollution. Also, they kill bats and birds. Dead bats found near turbines show internal organ damage, even though they were not hit by the fan blades.

[Salgak]

I use the term “Watermelon”: Green on the outside, but Red through and through under the shell. . .

[MrEdd]

The primary killer of every form of wildlife is starvation.
Every bird or bat that flies into a windmill means another bird or bat which would have starved gets to live. Carrion takes care of the carcass and life goes on.

[bert]

I drove by the sprawling Volvo truck plant in Dublin Virginia yesterday. Out front, near by the two platforms displaying shiny Volvo tractors was a spindly wind generator . It was colorful, yellow and shiny but obviusly green. It was not generating it was earning $$ just being seen.

[BanLibDems]

I agree with you. As for Salazar, I personally feel that he, CHU and that witch in charge of the EPA should be thrown into a rubber room along with all of the members of Greenpeace and the Sierra Club.