Power needed, but NIMBY
We all want modern power at our fingertips—to see that critical game on TV, to surf the net on our PC and remain cool during Stafford’s occasionally wretched summer evenings that often drip humidity.
Residents here in Northern VA. have been fortunate in having enough electricity to maintain our upscale lifestyles most of the time. Perhaps the memory grows gentler with age, but power failures—at least in north Stafford—seem to have been infrequent and short over the past quarter-century.
When they have happened, it’s mostly because of storms hitting trees and cutting power lines or lightning striking electric substations or transformers.
We are luckier than in some other places (Ernesto was a pussycat here) or perhaps better prepared. St. Louis has endured a lengthy and damaging storm-caused power failure this summer and California’s long heat wave has overtaxed its inadequate power-grid system once again.
Remember in the summer of 2003 there was that huge two-day failure in the Northeast that darkened cities from Ohio through New York City. Something having to do with energy power switching apparently didn’t work right. Memphis suffered a long powerless spell then also.
Power shortages have been rare here, I would argue, because our electric utility was one of the first to get nuclear plants on line, at North Anna and Jamestown. They have been safely and hugely productive ever since, and planned expansion at North Anna is underway. Good for them, and for the fine recreational amenity, Lake Anna, created in the 1960s to facilitate its plant.
There have been huge failures due to inadequacy elsewhere, however, and northern Virginia’s power grid is also said to be highly vulnerable. So it’s no wonder people are wondering how to remedy the problems. The solutions are not hard to come by. Implementing them is.
Build more nuclear generating plants. Build more hydroelectric dams. Produce more of the natural gas that powers many electric plants. String more electric power lines. (In the past decade, electric use has increased twice as fast as carrying capacity.)
Things like that, so easy to understand, face huge obstacles.
Why? Partly it’s Nimby (not in my back yard).
A larger factor is religion. The religion of environmentalism generates fanatics beyond comprehension.
Rage against the building of new electric power lines, and against major utilities in general, is now on display here. Dominion Virginia Power wants to string a new line through built-up areas in north Stafford. Other opponents are lining up to protest expansion of the nuclear facility at Lake Anna. Elsewhere it’s much the same, as America’s energy consumption grows faster than production and distribution. Anti-power Web sites abound. Just Google “power line dangers” and see for yourself.
And wait until all-electric cars really do get better and trendy. Nice and clean; but it won’t be long until we’ll have sundown brownouts when commuters drive their cars into the garage and plug into the juice for recharging. That will surely happen unless generating capacity and distribution can be allowed to grow.
I can understand residents not wanting a huge highline tower in their back yards.(Mine is not enhanced by the nearby towers.) And if Dominion Power can be persuaded instead to bring in the new lines over less populated areas, that’s good. But when such opposition extends to rages against power environment-wide, I have problems.
“The madness of crowds” comes to mind. A good example arose years ago in the banning of DDT, the pesticide that cleansed America of malaria. But then environmentalists stoked fears that it’s too harmful to wildlife, keeping DDT from being used to save children’s lives in Africa. It’s cheap. It works. But by successfully opposing it, the radical environmentalists probably have killed more people than Saddam Hussein ever did.
The same kind of madness is on display whenever Al Gore preaches that we’re the cause of global climate change, and not the sun. And otherwise sane people cheer: “The scientific debate is over!”
No, it’s hardly begun.
“The media treat global warming like it’s a new idea. In fact, back in 1938, British amateur meteorologist G. S. Callendar argued that mankind was responsible for heating up the planet with carbon dioxide emissions. That was decades before scientists and journalists alerted the public about the threat of a new ice age.”— Media Research Center.
And again, here’s my old friend and noted skeptic on global warming, the Hudson Institute's Dennis Avery: “The vast majority of our warming occurred before 1940… The Antarctic has been cooling since the 1960s. The Arctic, except Alaska, was warmer in 1930 than today.”
But everyone knows global warming is getting worse and DDT kills birds, and electricity from atomic plants is evil. Right?
Not everyone.
Residents here in Northern VA. have been fortunate in having enough electricity to maintain our upscale lifestyles most of the time. Perhaps the memory grows gentler with age, but power failures—at least in north Stafford—seem to have been infrequent and short over the past quarter-century.
When they have happened, it’s mostly because of storms hitting trees and cutting power lines or lightning striking electric substations or transformers.
We are luckier than in some other places (Ernesto was a pussycat here) or perhaps better prepared. St. Louis has endured a lengthy and damaging storm-caused power failure this summer and California’s long heat wave has overtaxed its inadequate power-grid system once again.
Remember in the summer of 2003 there was that huge two-day failure in the Northeast that darkened cities from Ohio through New York City. Something having to do with energy power switching apparently didn’t work right. Memphis suffered a long powerless spell then also.
Power shortages have been rare here, I would argue, because our electric utility was one of the first to get nuclear plants on line, at North Anna and Jamestown. They have been safely and hugely productive ever since, and planned expansion at North Anna is underway. Good for them, and for the fine recreational amenity, Lake Anna, created in the 1960s to facilitate its plant.
There have been huge failures due to inadequacy elsewhere, however, and northern Virginia’s power grid is also said to be highly vulnerable. So it’s no wonder people are wondering how to remedy the problems. The solutions are not hard to come by. Implementing them is.
Build more nuclear generating plants. Build more hydroelectric dams. Produce more of the natural gas that powers many electric plants. String more electric power lines. (In the past decade, electric use has increased twice as fast as carrying capacity.)
Things like that, so easy to understand, face huge obstacles.
Why? Partly it’s Nimby (not in my back yard).
A larger factor is religion. The religion of environmentalism generates fanatics beyond comprehension.
Rage against the building of new electric power lines, and against major utilities in general, is now on display here. Dominion Virginia Power wants to string a new line through built-up areas in north Stafford. Other opponents are lining up to protest expansion of the nuclear facility at Lake Anna. Elsewhere it’s much the same, as America’s energy consumption grows faster than production and distribution. Anti-power Web sites abound. Just Google “power line dangers” and see for yourself.
And wait until all-electric cars really do get better and trendy. Nice and clean; but it won’t be long until we’ll have sundown brownouts when commuters drive their cars into the garage and plug into the juice for recharging. That will surely happen unless generating capacity and distribution can be allowed to grow.
I can understand residents not wanting a huge highline tower in their back yards.(Mine is not enhanced by the nearby towers.) And if Dominion Power can be persuaded instead to bring in the new lines over less populated areas, that’s good. But when such opposition extends to rages against power environment-wide, I have problems.
“The madness of crowds” comes to mind. A good example arose years ago in the banning of DDT, the pesticide that cleansed America of malaria. But then environmentalists stoked fears that it’s too harmful to wildlife, keeping DDT from being used to save children’s lives in Africa. It’s cheap. It works. But by successfully opposing it, the radical environmentalists probably have killed more people than Saddam Hussein ever did.
The same kind of madness is on display whenever Al Gore preaches that we’re the cause of global climate change, and not the sun. And otherwise sane people cheer: “The scientific debate is over!”
No, it’s hardly begun.
“The media treat global warming like it’s a new idea. In fact, back in 1938, British amateur meteorologist G. S. Callendar argued that mankind was responsible for heating up the planet with carbon dioxide emissions. That was decades before scientists and journalists alerted the public about the threat of a new ice age.”— Media Research Center.
And again, here’s my old friend and noted skeptic on global warming, the Hudson Institute's Dennis Avery: “The vast majority of our warming occurred before 1940… The Antarctic has been cooling since the 1960s. The Arctic, except Alaska, was warmer in 1930 than today.”
But everyone knows global warming is getting worse and DDT kills birds, and electricity from atomic plants is evil. Right?
Not everyone.
posted by Ben Blankenship at
12:06 PM
