Sunday, March 22, 2009

 

Environmentalists Do Not Want Solar Panels

After all the environmentalists complaining about fossil fuels hurting the planet and causing global warming and every other bad thing in the world, we have been relegated to wind and solar energy that a few short months ago everyone was talking about as the savior of the world.  Well in the San Francisco Bay area the environmentalists have previously protested wind farms because they can kill birds with the big blades.  And in the San Diego area they are protesting the power lines that will bring the electricity from a proposed solar panel farm into the city.
So after all the hoopla that we need to get off oil and onto solar, now the Democrats are getting into the anti-solar farm fight.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, who I normally see as one of the more reasonable Democrats in Congress has said no to solar panels in the Mojave Desert.  

WASHINGTON -- California's Mojave Desert may seem ideally suited for solar energy production, but concern over what several proposed projects might do to the aesthetics of the region and its tortoise population is setting up a potential clash between conservationists and companies seeking to develop renewable energy.

Nineteen companies have submitted applications to build solar or wind facilities on a parcel of 500,000 desert acres, but Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Friday such development would violate the spirit of what conservationists had intended when they donated much of the land to the public.

Feinstein said Friday she intends to push legislation that would turn the land into a national monument, which would allow for existing uses to continue while preventing future development.

"It would destroy the entire Mojave Desert ecosystem," said David Myers, executive director of The Wildlands Conservancy.

So the solar projects would ruin the entire desert eco-system.  But the part that they want to put solar panels on is between to other protected areas.  So how could this ruin the entire ecosystem. Typical environmentalist spouting doom and gloom with no science to  back it up.

In a speech last year, Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger complained about environmental concerns slowing down the approval of solar plants in California.

"If we cannot put solar power plants in the Mojave desert, I don't know where the hell we can put it," Schwarzenegger said at Yale University.

You tell them Arnold.

The land lies in the southeast corner of California, between the existing Mojave National Preserve on the north and Joshua Tree National Park on the south.

"They all have to go through a rigorous environmental analysis now," Miller said. "It will be at best close to two years out before we get some of these grants approved."

At least 2 more years of reviewing the permits for the solar panels before any work could start.  This is exactly what was blamed for California's energy crisis a few years back.  The permit process takes so long for anything to get done, that many companies give up or never try.

It is just so frustrating how these people think.

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Monday, March 02, 2009

 

Toilet Paper an Environmental Threat?!

You cannot make this stuff up folks. First SUVs and now the environmental movement is after toilet paper. I guess they want us to use corn cobs. But then what would we use to make ethanol. The environmental movement seems to want to return to the 1700's which is almost as bad as the Taliban who want us to return to the 1500's. I had to laugh when I read this article.

Fluffy Toilet Paper Said to Be Worse for Environment Than Hummers

Sunday, March 01, 2009

That super-soft toilet paper you're fond of using? It's an ecological disaster, environmentalists say.

Millions of trees are harvested throughout the Americas – including rare old-growth forests in Canada – to sustain the United States’ obsession with quilted, ultra-soft, multi-ply toilet paper, the New York Times reported.

Although toilet paper manufacturers could produce products from recycled materials at a similar cost, the newspaper reported, the fiber taken from standing trees are necessary to help give the tissue its fluffy feel.

“No forest of any kind should be used to make toilet paper,” said Dr. Allen Hershkowitz, a senior scientist and waste expert with the Natural Resource Defense Council told the Times.

The United States is the largest market for toilet paper in the world, the newspaper reported, but tissue from 100 percent recycled fibers makes up less than 2 percent of sales for at-home use among conventional and premium brands.

People from other countries throughout Europe and Latin America are far less picky about what they use to wipe.

“This is a product that we use for less than three seconds and the ecological consequences of manufacturing it from trees is enormous,” Hershkowitz told the Guardian newspaper, which cited the chemicals used in pulp manufacturing and process of cutting down forests.

“Future generations are going to look at the way we make toilet paper as one of the greatest excesses of our age," Hershkowitz said. "Making toilet paper from virgin wood is a lot worse than driving Hummers in terms of global warming pollution.”

However, hope is on the horizon, if Hollywood is any indicator. The Times reported the Academy Awards ceremony last weekend used 100 percent recycled toilet paper at the Kodak Theater’s restrooms.

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