Dear Editor,
At the risk of being politically incorrect, here’s comment on a couple topics in the Sept. 28 issue of the Saratoga Sun. The historical completion of the Ferris Haggerty tramway, described in detail, and our knowledge of the failure of the venture, begs comparison to renewable energy projects of today. The hype is quite similar. The copper was from a mine that was deficient in content. The expensive wind power lacks customers to buy it.
The driver behind renewable replacing carbon energy is carbon emissions cause global warming or now climate change which is now any variable weather event, hot or cold, wet or dry. Humans, capitalist humans, are responsible of course. It doesn’t matter that carbon dioxide, the carbon compound blamed, is the basis of all plant life and by extension all animal life because oxygen is a product of plant photosynthesis. Every science student in the world knows this. Increase of CO2 only causes more plant growth.
Coal, natural gas, nuclear, geothermal and hydro all produce electricity at half the cost of wind or solar. Politicians ignore common sense of least cost to consumers to legislate mandated renewables production. All in the name of reducing carbon emissions, that have nothing to do with climate variability. The carbon tax cabal and the media cheerleaders are amazed that less than 40 percent of citizens believe in that cause and theory, while a “vast majority” of the “learned academics” endorse human caused climate change. Could it be more than 60 percent of the citizens have more common sense than the “smart people?” Furthermore, check out any Wal-Mart parking lot if you doubt the importance of dollar value to most Americans. Don’t sell the American people short in making smart choices.
Thank you for this space.
Sincerely,
Scott Kerbs, Saratoga
Editor’s Note: According to the Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook released in 2015, onshore wind power had a lower levelized cost of electricity than natural gas, coal or nuclear. While solar still was on the high (but comparable) side, Bloomberg notes in an April 2016 article entitled; Wind and Solar are Crushing Fossil Fuels: Record clean energy investment outpaces gas and coal 2 to 1, costs have and are lowering for wind and solar—and those industries have each doubled several times since 2000 (wind has doubled four times, solar seven).
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