Your Renewable Energy Goals Are Not My Problem

It's politically correct for everyone to have renewable energy goals these days.  From corporations to governments, everyone wants to look like they're doing their part to make energy cleaner.  But what about when you're not really doing your part and instead trying to force other people to do your part for you?  It's all well and good to take personal responsibility for your environmental footprint, but not so much when your efforts include making your environmental footprint someone else's problem.  If you demand that the power you consume must be greener, shouldn't you be willing to sacrifice to get there?

The politically correct and politically connected are increasingly demanding that their environmental goals must be met through the sacrifice of others.  Maybe we shouldn't blame them for their selfishness.  Perhaps they earned it honestly over the years because the sacrifice of others to provide the energy that powers their bastions of urban utopia was never questioned or opposed. 

"West Virginia?  Oh, those poor folks like coal and pollution because it provides jobs.  Put all the power plants, transmission lines and other undesirable infrastructure there.  They don't mind."

But now maybe they do mind.  So now you think, "Let's clean up our environment and stop buying dirty stuff from there!  Let's buy clean energy from somewhere else!"

How about you make your own energy... for once?  How about you build a power generator in your own neighborhood?  But that's too costly, you say, there's not enough space for new power generators, and besides, you don't want energy infrastructure in our own back yards!

Exactly.  So what makes you think others do?  Especially when the others won't receive any benefit from your infrastructure?  Oh sure, the renewable energy enthusiasts and the companies who make money hand over fist meeting their needs try to pretend areas hosting new energy infrastructure will "benefit" from new projects.  But that's all they present -- trumped up benefits with absolutely no mention of all the local detriments that come with this infrastructure.  Payments to local governments or environmental groups are nothing more than dirty hush money.  That money will run out soon, but the detriments will be permanent.

Big wind is destroying rural middle America, turning it into an industrial wasteland and fomenting bitter animosity that destroys formerly peaceful communities.  And what for?  So they can export the idea of wind power to urban communities, and make a bundle of tax dollars in the process.  When the handouts stop, so will the push for Midwest wind, but by that time, what will be left?

Eastern states with renewable energy goals are calling for more "clean" power, and the companies who build transmission are only too happy to offer it to them.  Instead of building clean generators in their own communities, certain states want to import it from some far off golden renewable land where they don't have to make any sacrifice to produce it.  I'm talking about you, Massachusetts.

First it was Northern Pass, which promised to bring "renewable" hydro power from Canada.  Massachusetts doesn't connect with Canada, therefore Northern Pass suggested stomping through New Hampshire on its way south, like Godzilla on his way to Tokyo.  Except New Hamphire refused to be the sacrificial lamb for Massachusetts needs.  So now it's "New England Clean Energy Connect," another aerial transmission project that uses Maine as the sacrificial lamb.  Central Maine Power says Maine doesn't mind, and in fact many towns and business groups have "endorsed" the project.  Everything's good, right?  Maine loves making a sacrifice to its own environment and economic prospects in order to meet Massachusetts renewable energy goals.  Well, maybe not.  It's not so easy...

But Maine regulators must find that NECEC will benefit Maine residents, even though none of its electricity will be sold in Maine. Additionally, the project’s direct-current design restricts instate generators — such as wind or solar farms — from hooking up to the line.

It's deja vu all over again.  One state is being asked to sacrifice for the needs of another.  And we're not just talking about bringing in power to keep the lights on in that other state, we're talking about bringing in "cleaner" power so that the other state can continue to use as much as it wants without harming their delicate environmental conscience.  And just like the last project, there is opposition.

And some of this opposition has a different character.

But opponents, which include national energy companies that own competing power plants, say the project could force their plants offline, costing jobs, tax revenue and the ability to build new wind and solar projects in Maine.

And national energy companies have a lot of resources to refute the murky claims of benefit being offered by project owner, Central Maine Power.  Such as:

• Maine power plants, including Wyman Station in Yarmouth, could close, and hundreds of jobs and more than $5 million in property tax revenue would be lost.
• Several Maine wind and solar projects could be canceled, too, because the line would be designed like an interstate highway from Canada with no on-ramps in Maine for other generated power.
• Despite being labeled a clean project, the line wouldn’t really lower carbon emissions that accelerate climate change because no new hydropower facilities would be built, meaning fossil-fuel power plants outside New England would be called on to backfill demand in New York state and elsewhere created by the diversion of power to Massachusetts.

And those claims that construction of the project will lower electric costs throughout the region, including Maine, are also being challenged.

Asked Tuesday to clarify the $40 million savings to Maine ratepayers, John Carroll, an Avangrid spokesman, said an analysis done for the company attempts to quantify the “downward pressure” on energy prices in the wholesale markets. The effect, he said, is similar to using less of a higher-cost fuel to meet electric demand; it produces lower prices for consumers.
In the testimony, opponents acknowledge that the project could “suppress” wholesale electric rates at first. But Tanya Bodell, executive director at Energyzt Advisors LLC in Boston, said that falling prices associated with other planned renewable generation projects would soon negate the impact of the new transmission line.

Let's be real here, shall we?  This project doesn't benefit Maine, it benefits Massachusetts.  And when this proposal also fails, will Massachusetts move on to the next?  Or will they finally take responsibility for meeting their own ambitious goals?

Transmission projects that visit the "needs" of one state or geographic region on the beauty and economic prosperity of another are doomed to failure.  We're not all a bunch of short-sighted bumpkins who will swoon over a pile of shiny beads.  That only happens in history books.

The only kind of transmission project that stands a chance anymore is one like this.  Completely buried along public rights of way or underwater.  Why hasn't Massachusetts selected one like that?  Because supplying Massachusetts with renewable energy is cost competitive, and doing the right thing costs too much.  When you set your renewable energy goals, Massachusetts, did you think it would be cheap?  Did you think it was going to be easy to visit your needs on other states?  It's not.  You set your goals, you need to meet them at your own expense.  Your goals = your problem.