The New York Times carried an interesting article on June 5 about environmentalists squaring off with other environmentalists over wind farms designed to harness the wind to produce energy.
Wind farms never made much sense when you have such other viable low-footprint options such as nuclear power, but the federal government offers tax breaks to wind farms and hence people are beginning to build more of them — and some environmentalists are beginning to apply the same obstructionist tactics that they would normally apply to more traditional power generating projects.
It was objections from environmentalists such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., for example, that were responsible for bringing to a halt — at least temporarily — construction of the first off-shore wind farm in the United States. The wind farm was to have been placed of Cape Codd in Nantucket Sound, but the power generating facility is just too ugly to be tolerated.
As businessman Wayne Kurker told the New York Times on why he opposed the wind farm,
I didn’t like the idea that what we consider our Grand Canyon was all of a sudden going to be industrialized.
I.e., generate low-polluting electricity, just do it in someone else’s backyard.
Charles Komanoff, who the Times describes as a “longtime economic consultant to environmental groups” told the Times that such motives are just selfish,
They want to have it all and they won’t brook any trade-off, especially a trade-off that sacrifices their own comfort.
The American Wind Energy Association tells the Times that although wind power generates less than 1 percent of the electricity produced in the United States, by 2020 they predict that will be up to 6 percent. I suspect that prediction’s just a lot of hot air.
Source:
Windmills sow dissent for environmentalists. Katharine Q. Seelye, The New York Times, June 5, 2003.
Wind power is a good source of electricity but it also takes up lots of space just like solar power plants.:,.