201–210 of 214 posts
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Probably not a good precedent to set.
We set it all the time over here in Utah. Some heavy tourist cities wanted to ban plastic bags at grocery stores. The state swooped in and made it illegal to ban plastic bags in the entire state. The "free market" has to decide if we want them or not.
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Well the alternative to more renewables is, realistically, more coal and gas. I think that covering up one or two percent of even the most valuable biomes with solar panels is no where near as destructive as climate change.
Another alternative is reducing energy consumption. I'm sure the people of California have no problem with the consequences of that.
EVs are also taking hold faster in CA due to their better economics and broader cultural appeal in CA.
All these trends will lower the per capita energy consumption further without negatively affecting lifestyles.
1. https://www.eia.gov/state/seds/data.php?incfile=/state/seds/...
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> Ivanpah Solar Power Facility Blew my mind when I drove past that (on the way to Las Vegas?). I swear it appeared as though the air was incandescing at the top of the tower where all the sun's rays were focused. Def something out of a Sci-Fi film....
You truly don’t understand how blinding it is until you drive past it. I didn’t realize it was in San Bernardino. I saw it driving from Las Vegas to SF. Remember it being near Zzyzx which reminded me of Sonic Youth music video.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crescent_Dunes_Solar_Energy_Pr...
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I was impressed with the community that didn't want their own kid's teachers living near them for fear it would reduce property values. https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/10/06/turn-schools-into-tea...
Moving the schools is not required to help the teachers find housing. The community reacted negatively to the way it was presented and the political games being played, including the media coverage which has been mostly simplistic and one-sided at best thus far. Ideally the “new school” site could be turned into housing instead of destroying the center of the community which will require difficult zoning changes (cur…
>will require difficult zoning changes
Communities are now too blinded by greed to make these decisions honestly. Zoning decisions need to move to the state level.
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The Fukushima disaster almost got to the point where they had to evacuate Tokyo . I support nuclear power, but to say that it is without risks and the public is just irrational is disingenuous.
Nobody has nor anyone will die from Fukushima. Tokyo wasn't evacuated. I didn't say nuclear is without risks, but it is safer than other methods of producing lots of electricity
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Can you explain why? I can see how it would be undesirable to locals, but clear cutting redwoods would release massive amounts of stored carbon, whereas solar panels in the desert would seem to do the opposite.
The desert isn't a blank sandscape. There's a whole ecosystem of desert plants and creatures, not to mention the solar panels killing migratory birds.
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This gets to a conflict of values between different environmentalists - a lot of people are willing to accept local environmental damage in order to counter climate change.
The people willing to accept “local” environmental change are not local, are they? Let’s be honest, coastal liberals want to build solar in the desert so they can charge their Teslas with a clear conscience. The people actually living there resent this. It’s the same dynamic that’s been playing out for over a century between urban and rural CA as regards water.
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The article reports on the conflict between and claims of two parties. Doing research into claim validity has its place (investigative journalism) but not in an article that is just reporting on a conflict, in fact including such research would very likely be unethical.
You're going to have to explain how a journalist doing fact checking is unethical.
A news article is like that in a court of public opinion where the public is the judge and the reporter is merely there to report on both sides of the argument, not supposed to be doing research on their own, it is up to the other side to fact check and add that to their argument, it isn’t the reporter’s job or even their place ethically.
There is definitely room for reporters doing fact checking and more involved investigative journalism, just not in that kind of article.
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Nobody has nor anyone will die from Fukushima. Tokyo wasn't evacuated. I didn't say nuclear is without risks, but it is safer than other methods of producing lots of electricity
This is just plain wrong. Although only one person has died from radiation YET, over 2000 died during/from evacuation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disa...
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Might be an interesting terraforming project: bring some water along with the electrical infra, plant drought resistant shrubs and watch as they start covering soil, capturing moisture and so on...
Or maybe just leave the desert ecosystem alone? I am not sure why people think that a desert is bare and empty, I guess most just assume that because you can't see it as easily as you can in a forest that there is nothing there, but desert ecosystems are much more fragile than most other ecosystems and do not adjust easily to random interference.
I won't pretend that I know these projects are well-sited or they couldn't easily be done in a better way to lessen their impact. But, you can't use "it has a new harm" as an a priori veto of changes when the status quo is so deeply, deeply harmful.