Just today I received a comment on my blog from the post “Big Coal Rides Again”. Apparently the commenter thought that if am against coal, then I must be for nuclear power.

They also stated;

We Need NEW Clean Renewable CHEAPER DE-Centralized, off the Grid, NON-Monopoly energy.

I couldn’t agree with that more, except that I don’t see the “NON-monopoly” part happening. Also, to me off the grid means that each house is not connected to the electric company lines. Again, not likely to happen in my lifetime.

This person also provided a link to an article in July of 2007 in NY Times talking about the government possibly putting up up 25-30 billion dollars to guarantee loans made to the nuclear industry for building new power plants. Yet according to page 2 of the same article,

The House recently passed an appropriations bill for energy and water programs that included $7 billion in loan guarantees for projects involving renewable energy and specifically excluded nuclear plants.

I say forget the new nuke plants. Let put the 25 billion into backing loans made to renewable energy. Right now, the most cost comparable solution to fossil fuels is wind. According to this issue of The Progressive Engineer from 2002:

Since 1980, the price of wind power has dropped from 40 cents per kilowatt-hour to 4-7 cents today, only slightly higher than fossil fuel and well below the 20-cent cost for solar electricity.

There are far fewer environmental concerns from wind turbines than from mining and burning coal, yet there are still people against the turbines. They claim that the turbines hurt the surrounding property values. There are also problems with birds getting in the way. Yet over the last few years, these issues have been addressed and have become not so much of a problem. From the same article in The Progressive Engineer:

Meanwhile, machines have become friendlier to their surroundings, as well, in response to early-generation models that annoyed neighbors and killed large numbers of birds. Towers consist of tubular steel with fewer perches for birds, and slower-rotating rotors kill fewer of them. Tubular towers, usually painted off-white or gray to blend with the sky, also prove quieter than the lattice structures previously used. Verkleeren, project manager for the Mill Run and Somerset sites, notes, “One thing that surprised me most is how quiet they are.”

An article on NPR, Wind Farms Draw Mixed Response in Appalachia addresses the negatives of the towers. There are claims that the towers affect the rural areas tourism rates, yet there are also claims that tourists are coming in just to see and photograph the turbines. There are also claims the the sound generated by the turbines scare away the wildlife. I bet with time, the wildlife will adapt to the sound.

America’s Green Policy Vacuum from the Feb. issue of Businessweek states that

In 2006, companies in renewable energy and energy efficiency industries accounted for 8.5 million jobs and generated $970 billion in revenues and the green economy could produce as many as 40 million jobs and $4.53 trillion in annual revenue by 2030.

With numbers like those, I can’t believe we are not concentrating more on renewable energy source- oh wait yes I can, it must not be profitable for the big ceo’s who run the country’s corporations.

It seems obvious to me that the citizens against these towers have never lived near a strip mine or mountaintop removal site. Maybe that is why the public needs educated on what mountaintop removal really entails. To me its simple. Would you rather see the first picture or the second as you look out the backdoor or are hiking?

(credit: Green Mountain Energy Company and the D.O.E.)