Environmental protests seem to be on the rise these days. On Monday, six people were arrested at a protest of the Lowell Mountain wind power project. There’s active opposition to a wind project on Grandpa’s Knob in Pittsford. Concern over smart meters prompted the Legislature to allow people to opt out without paying a fee. A pair of artists who live (part-time) in the Northeast Kingdom are planning a protest over wind power, smart meters, and the state Public Service Board. Heck, there’s even a handful of folks in East Charlotte trying to block a proposed solar-power array.
Well, all right then. Defenders of the Earth, taking a stand to keep Vermont pure. They are to be commended, right?
Nope, nope, nope, nope, and nope.
The protests against wind, solar, and smart meters are misguided at best, selfish at worst. They impede measures that would mitigate climate change. Indeed, they — consciously or otherwise — give aid and comfort to the fossil fuel industry’s drive to maximize profit at the expense of the planet.
I’ve been thinking about this for quite a while. But two recent articles prompted me to turn those thoughts into words: “The Reckoning,” Bill McKibben’s concise, excellent, and profoundly scary piece on climate change in Rolling Stone; and “Clean Energy Under Siege,” in which the Sierra Club exposes the fossil fuel industry’s bankrolling of opposition to wind, solar, and other renewable energy sources.
McKibben. In just a few pages, he lays out the reality of climate change with stark clarity: We’ve already pumped enough carbon into the atmosphere to cause serious damage. If carbon emissions continue apace, we will soon pass the point where the environment will undergo radical change. If we fully exploit all the known reserves of fossil fuels, the earth will become “a planet straight out of science fiction.” And the fossil fuel industry, while belatedly acknowledging the reality of climate change, is hellbent on exploiting all those reserves and discovering even more.
Sierra Club. Its new report documents how the fossil fuel industry, fearful of the growing competitive threat from renewable energy, is pouring millions into fake “grassroots” organizations that try to provoke local opposition to wind and other energy, and bogus “institutes” that churn out biased “studies” claiming to uncover environmental problems with renewables. It’s the ultimate in greenwashing: creating a faux-environmental movement that’s actually supporting the destruction of the planet.
And some of our fellow Vermonters have been sucked into this.
Think I’m being unfair? Here’s one small example. In May, opponents of the Lowell Mountain wind project invited Lisa Linowes to speak. She was billed as “a nationally renowned consultant on the impacts of wind energy generation.” Not mentioned: she’s head of a staunch anti-wind organization, the Industrial Wind Action Group, which has ties to the Koch Brothers. Her husband is an influential figure in the corporate-funded Tea Party. She’s a featured player in the Sierra Club’s report on Big Oil’s astroturf movement. She is, in short, a fake environmentalist out to kill renewable energy.
And our anti-wind activists gave her a platform. Thanks, folks.
As for smart meters, they are valuable tools in lowering peak electricity demand — a major driver in the growth of our power system and its continued reliance on fossil fuels. The arguments against smart meters are bogus, almost nonsensical. Radio waves? You get far more of them in an average household than you’d get if you parked yourself right next to a smart meter 24/7. Privacy? A periodic snapshot of your total power consumption will not provide any useful information about your personal life.
The Sierra Club’s report acknowledges that there is no way to generate energy without some measure of environmental impact. There is no absolutely green power source. But wind and solar are two of the very cleanest, and they are vital if we are to limit the impact of climate change. There may be good reasons for opposing a specific project, and renewable development must be thoroughly regulated; but to oppose any and all renewable projects in Vermont is shortsighted and irresponsible.
The anti-wind protesters say they are trying to preserve Vermont’s pristine environment. But as the earth continues to heat up and our pristine environment is radically transformed, what will the protests have accomplished? The earth is changing, and the installation of wind turbines on some of our ridgelines is the least of our environmental challenges. Climate change won’t stop at the state line because we steadfastly objected to wind energy.
But, say the protesters, wind turbines on Lowell Mountain “won’t contribute significantly to combating climate change.” True enough. The problem is so huge that no single project or power source will “contribute significantly.” That’s why we need to do a lot of things — wind, solar, smart meters, energy efficiency, electric cars, carbon taxes, etc.
Put it this way: If you came upon a house fire and you had a bucket of water, would you refuse to pour it on the flames because it wouldn’t contribute significantly to putting out the fire? I sure hope not.
But that’s exactly what our shortsighted protesters are doing. Pardon me if I don’t applaud.
Interesting about Koch-connected Lisa Linowes speaking at the anti-wind thing. Is there similar astroturfing going on with smart meter disinfo too?
With some opposition to wind, it’s not opposition to wind power – it’s opposition to industrial-scale wind power projects, and the environmental damage connected to that. It’s opposition to stripping forests off ridgelines for profit.
You want to build a wind tower and generate electricity for yourself and a few neighbors, great. It takes a small part of the load off the grid and may even put some energy back in. One turbine, one tower = distributed power, not industrial clear cutting for shareholder profits.
Not all opposition to wind power projects is about the wind: it’s about who loses what and who win(d)s.
Please stop conflating opposition to industrial scale wind projects to opposition to wind as a “clean” source of energy. Such conflation serves GMP’s agenda to the same degree that you suppose the opposition to industrial scale wind power projects serves the agenda of the fossil fuel industry.
NanuqFC
In order to insure a healthy social and industrial life, every big corporation should be held responsible by, and be accountable to, some sovereign strong enough to control its conduct. ~ Theodore Roosevelt
Great piece. Some thoughts.
There is no “none of the above” when it comes to energy production. It is a path paved with environmental damage. Even blessed photovoltaic panels (which I install for a living) come mostly from factories in China. We are merely exporting the environmental damage to other places and other people. It is intellectually dishonest to say NIMBY without saying SEBY (Somebody Else’s Back Yard). Who do you want to pay the price for your cheap, constant stream of electricity? No vague hand waving allowed.
We get about a third as much sun in the winter as in the summer. If you want an all solar solution, then be prepared to cut your electrical use by that much or else pay many times more per kWh in the winter. We do get much more wind in the winter. Hydro peaks in the spring and comes back in the fall. See how it all works out?
The scale of wind is related to efficiencies of scale. Wind turbine manufacturers aren’t designing larger turbines just because. The bigger machines turn out cheaper electricity, which make them more competitive with mountaintop removal coal, leaky nuclear, and fracked gas. We could install all 100 kW turbines (as opposed to the 1 to 3 megawatt units), but then we’d be paying double or triple the price per kWh. “Industrial scale” wind power is affordable, competitive wind power.
You can look up a study on smart meter EMF on the VT PSD website. Short form: They had to press the detection device up against the meter to get it to show up over the background levels. Two feet away it was lost in the electromagnetic fog. People worry about the unfamiliar instead of much greater commonplace risks.
As we inevitably transition from fossil fueled and nuclear power, which can operate at a controllable level, to variable renewables, we are going to have to implement demand side management. That is, real time demand management. That means turning off (or not turning on) certain appliances and industrial machinery depending on production levels. That requires smart metering. Deal with smart meters or deal with blackouts and brownouts.
Pursuing renewable energy (as we must) means dealing with the downsides and inconveniences directly, on our own turf.
My facebook link to this article has generated (get it?) a discussion about the cost/benefits of nuclear power. Feel free to chime in! http://www.facebook.com/billsi…
The same people who suddenly endorse blasting the hell out of the last wild places in Vermont are also the same folks who suddenly decided that the tragic Hydro-Quebec James Bay project was “green energy”! After all none of these are affecting us in our Yuppie enclaves in Montpelier or Burlington, who cares if the economically disadvantaged in the NEK have to have their environment compromised and who cares if the Cree in N Quebec had there 10,000 year relationship with the caribou destroyed. We all feel great and righteous in yuppie land. Before there’s another wind abomination put in, there should be towers on the Burlington waterfront, on the Sand Bar, Mount Philo, Juniper Island and while we’re at it, let’s put them on Mount Mansfield and Camels hump.
Small scale wind, combined with a storage system can work well in vermont. Large scale industrial wind is unreliable and unpredictable and will only serve the corporate interests who are preying on peoples justified fear of climate change
I don’t pretend to have an adequate grasp of the “big picture.”
Wind is undeniably a valuable piece in resolving our energy needs. However, from what I have been told about the Lowell project specifically, the developers have not done everything they could have to minimize impact on the environment.
That is the problem with for-profit energy systems of almost any kind. Their first priority will always be the investors’ return. Environmental responsibility comes a distant fourth, considerably after reliability and “managing” public relations.
Have you been up on the Lowell Mountains, before and after construction? I have. It was soaking wet last year, moss dripping off rocks everywhere. Now it’s bone dry. Headwater streams filled. Stormwater plans designed to move the water off the mountain as fast as possible. Blasted rock areas hot and dry, like a Wal-Mart parking lot.
Have you met with neighbors of these big wind projects? During construction their homes shake with the huge blasts, no protections like Act 250 has. It’s the wild west up there.
If you have no respect for water or people, then go ahead and support wind. But please get out in the real world and see for yourselves what’s happening and why very intelligent people are stepping up to say STOP!!
If you want to address climate change, you will champion the values that Vermont’s mountains offer to adapt to climate change. Forests that are important carbon sinks, pure headwaters that are the source of life, and people who live around the mountains who are intimately connected to them and are seeing alarming changes before their very eyes, in the name of GREED energy, not GREEN energy.
And you can cover all the mountains in Vermont with wind turbines, and in all the eastern US for that matter, and you will not make a dent in global warming. The wind resource is miniscule in the east, and if we continue to blast away the mountains and fill in the headwaters and create noise that people and wildlife cannot live around, what have we accomplished? Destroying the very thing we need to adapt to climate change.
The Sierra Club, 350VT, VNRC, VPIRG, and others (representing 10,000s of Vermonters) all worked very hard last year to pass the renewable energy bill out of the General Assembly. Even the Vermont AFL-CIO lobbied in support of this effort as they correctly view this also a green jobs issue. That said, we lost the RPS but retained the incentives for small community renewables. And of course we will work very hard to advance our common renewable energy goals again this year. We all agree that we need to move as fast as possible in the direction of 100% renewables in Vermont and beyond. This must include well sited wind farms.
Note that the huge Moving Planet rally last year in Montpelier, which had over 1500 people there (making this the largest environmental rally in our capital’s history), was largely in support of a 100% renewable energy future. And again, the recent demonstrations in Burlington against the proposed tar sands pipeline (500-600 people) also carried with it an implied support for renewables. In short, as any and every poll indicates, Vermonters overwhelmingly support renewables, including new wind farms.
And finally, I believe the election this year for Governor, between Peter Shumlin (who supports new large wind farms), and Randy Brock (who opposes new large wind farms) will be a great opportunity, no matter what you believe, for Vermonters to again place their vote on this issue. So I do hope to see you all at the polls!
“If you came upon a house fire and you had a bucket of water, would you refuse to pour it on the flames because it wouldn’t contribute significantly to putting out the fire?”
That’s an accurate analogy. Wind is a symbolic gesture only. But the impacts of its erections are very real.
My objection to these meters is how they are being implemented. There are two versions of smart meters, ones that use RF to connect to the cell phone system, and ones that use the wired phone system (no RF). GMP is ONLY using the RF versions, their staff don’t even know there is a non-RF version that works just as well as the wireless one.
What I object to is the arrogance of GMP, that they pretend that the wireless one is the only one in existence, that they don’t offer RF sensitive people any choice.
Thank goodness we are allowed to opt-out since GMP refuses to offer the non-RF option.
The fossil fuel industry may be opposed to these projects, but that by itself doesn’t make that point of view wrong. I’m not aligned with fossil fuel companies in any way, never have been. But I’m completely against the ridge line solar projects in VT and the proposed solar farm in Charlotte.
I’m also opposed to corporations being indiscriminately demonized by liberals and progressives. It’s wrong, and irresponsible. Please do your own research rather than parroting Rolling Stone magazine (among other sources). You’ll find that in addition to creating jobs, many of these companies pour vast amounts of money and time into communities and charities. But you don’t hear much about that.
The Sierra Club and the author of this post work so strenuously to find links (however tenuous) between anti-industrial wind protesters and the fossil fuel industry when the reality, that Big Oil/Nuke/Coal and Wall Street LOVE wind projects and their subsidies, is in plain sight. Just have a look at the board of directors of AWEA (American Wind Energy Association), the PRO-wind lobby. http://www.awea.org/learnabout… GE, Exelon,BP,JP Morgan, the biggest and baddest of Oil/Nuke/Coal and Wall Street! These guys don’t just support the industrial wind industry, they ARE the industry. Our very own Green Mountain Power’s parent company, as we know, is up to its eyeballs in tar sands. And yet the anti-wind folks are somehow in bed with the fossil fuel industry? I applaud the mental agility of some to follow such twisted logic.
Why are the Sierra Club and others still going to such great lengths at character assassination of the folks opposing these projects? The Sierra Club report is a sham, “And some of our fellow Vermonters have been sucked into this.”
While knocking anti-winders for taking Koch money, don’t forget the big scandal over the Sierra Club taking $26 million in anonymous donations from natural gas interests. Likewise, note that the Koch bros. (no relation) also donate money to the Civil Liberties Union.
My power, but I don’t want it generated where it takes off the top of the mountain in my backyard. I want my power, but I don’t want those turbines in view. I want my power, but I dont want to deal with the realities of nuclear waste. I want my power (to drive), but I don’t want to deal with the realities of foreign oil, drilling in further afield and remote and pristine places. I want my power, but I dont want my neighbor to put in solar, the glare across the lake ruins my view. I want my MTV. But I need power to run the sat dish and the big screen.
Something. Somewhere. Has to, and will, give.
I miss John Odum.
Too much snark in this original post, me thinks.
The vast majority of people who answer polls that they like industrial wind – do not know much about it. I would’ve likely approved the abstract idea before I learned otherwise. Click over to wind-watch.org/news on any given day and read a few dozen news items and you may learn more. Or stream the movie Windfall, and watch how happy the folks in New York State are with their turbines.
We need our intact ecosystems to respond to future extreme weather events. Instead we are blithely throwing away something preciious on these ridgelines, without saving much fossil fuel in the process. Learn more about it before the snark sets in, folks.