One of the potential Democratic Party platforms for the 2020 election is the Green New Deal, a proposed economic stimulus package that aims to address climate change and economic inequality. Redwood Coast Energy Authority, our region’s community choice aggregator, recently passed a resolution in support of having 100% of the energy it resells from renewable (water, wind and sun) sources by 2025. The chances of these ever happening are zero.
All we hear from progressives is “climate change!” If you think we’re ever going to change from our dependence on fossil fuels to renewable energy, you’re not seeing the usual suspects of Regressives that fight renewable energy. It’s the same people over the past decades that oppose anything and everything here on the North Coast. Look no further that the proposed Terra-Gen wind energy project down by Scotia. Unlike sun in Humboldt County (boy, that’s an oxymoron), wind is something that Mother Nature produces daily. How much sun did Eureka see this past November through May? It’s hard to get solar energy when all we have are rain and clouds. Not to mention the cost of solar being around $15,000 per household. Also if you finance solar through an outside lender your property taxes will increase until your loan is paid off.
You’d think Progressive Humboldt County would get behind a renewable wind energy project, right? Wrong! “It’s a corporate project!” Of course it is. Do you have a spare $200 million in your checking account to finance this wind energy project? Clary wrote on a Facebook post, “It’s a horrible proposal made by a group (of) venture capitalists who don’t give a damn about chewing up birds. …” Yup, a nickname for wind energy turbines is a “bird blender.” Just curious, how many birds fly into your home and office windows along with your car windshields each year? Answer: millions. Your cats kill millions of birds every year. Power lines kill millions of birds every year. Should we get rid of your homes, cars, cats and power lines? Didn’t think so. By the way, the state of California just killed 1.2 million birds to stop the spread of a virus.
Think about this: even if you have a Tesla or Volt electric car, how do you charge your car? How many of these vocal opponents of the wind energy project walked or drove their bicycles to the public meetings? Maybe they’re happier with nuclear power, coal, oil and fracking for their energy use while telling us they are in favor of the Green New Deal. I’m tired with all the Regressives behind the Redwood Curtain who talk the talk, but don’t walk the walk. Instead of fighting each other, I’d recommend Terra-Gen sit at a table with labor and the environmental community and work out a compromise to a solution and move forward. Get ‘er done! That’s the definition of progress.
A trip down memory lane … back in 1999 the Eureka voters out turned down Measure J, which would have changed the zoning of the Balloon Track to allow a retail (Wal-Mart) on the site. The “No on J” camp focused much of its energy to free up the Balloon Track for port development. Curiously, how much port development has occurred on this site in the past 20 years? That would be zero and that’s the false narrative the Regressives constantly give you. “Wind energy is bad! This project is wrong! We’ll come up with something better … later.” In the meantime, another 20 years goes by with nothing. Oh yeah, Wal-Mart moved into principally permitted retail zoning, the former Gottschalks site at the Bayshore Mall in 2012. Today Wal-Mart now employs 125 people here locally and is a top-25 contributor to Eureka sales tax. Somehow Eureka survived.
Not to worry about that crude oil for your fossil fuel burning car engines as Vice President Mike Pence recently gave the West Point commencement speech and said, “It is a virtual certainty that you will fight on a battlefield for America at some point in your life. You will lead soldiers in combat. It will happen. Some of you will join the fight against radical Islamic terrorists in Afghanistan and Iraq.” It’s good to know that our sons and daughter will be fighting and dying in the Middle East for oil so that Chevron, ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell can make even more billions of profits at our expense. Wake up, people.
Matthew Owen resides in Eureka.
