To the editor: Reasons not to support Manchin-Schumer bill

An open letter to U.S. Sens. Patrick Leahy and Bernie Sanders and Rep. Peter Welch:

Please do not support the provisions of the Manchin-Schumer bill for a number of reasons.  To name some:

  1. How can further excessive government spending mitigate inflation if high government spending is one of the causes of inflation?
  2. The wind and solar industries were supposed to be weaned from tax credit incentives and stand on their own in the market.  They have not done so which suggests that they are creatures of government largess rather than healthy enterprises in their own right.  The taxpayers should no longer support these otherwise failing industries.
  3. We are learning more about the harmful environmental impact of wind and solar projects as well as the harmful social and environmental impact of mining, producing and disposing of the materials and components that are necessary to their manufacture and installation.
  4. Both wind and solar energy are intermittent sources that require backup energy from conventional sources.  WindPreview (opens in a new tab) and solar cannot stand alone as reliable energy sources; therefore, they should not be supported by the taxpayers.  They don’t solve the problem of providing reliable energy.
  5. Both wind and solar projects take up large areas of land relative to the amount of energy they provide.  That land has importance and value as needed farm, meadow, forest and open land.
  6. Wind projects are responsible for the deaths of large numbers of raptors, endangered bats and other bird species that are otherwise protected.  How does that make sense?
  7. Wind projects hurt the people who live near them as a result of infra-sound waves that they produce, shadow flicker, as well as audible noise.  More and more communities around the world are coming to understand that wind projects are destructive to the environment, to communities  and to the people who live near them.

Please do not let this bill pass.

Respectfully,

Anna Vesely Pilette
Grafton

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  1. Cynthia Prairie says:

    And we really wish people understood how newspapers work. Opinion pieces, such as comments and letters to the editors, are just that, opinions. They can be distorted, wrong-headed and ill-advised. But they are opinions, whether you agree with them or not.

    We just provide a place for people — including yourself — to express those opinions.

  2. I really wish this newspaper did fact checking.

    I’m tired of Don Quixote.

  3. Larry Carbonetti says:

    These points are nothing but oft-repeated right-wing, unsupported by fact, talking points.

    1. How is the spending “excessive?” By whose determination? Please provide actual, recognized evidence connecting the current inflation to government spending. This inflation is world-wide. In fact, US inflation is lower than much of the rest of the world.

    2. Wind and solar were “supposed to be weaned off subsidies?” According to whom? More significantly, all forms of energy are subsidized. Are you unaware of the gigantic subsidies going to the oil, coal and fracking industries? Why aren’t you concerned about those? Try, for instance, investigating the oil depletion allowance.

    3. No form of energy production is without effects. The effects of burning coal, oil and natural gas, however, are catastrophic-have you not noticed the climate disasters happening around the world? Do you think there are no costs associated with, for instance, the flooding in Kentucky, the fires in California and Alaska, or the increases in tornados?

    4. The old “intermittent” claim. The wind is always blowing somewhere. Currently, 12.5 % of all US energy production is from renewables. This number continues to grow. Texas, for example, is one of the largest producers of wind energy. I have solar panels on a house, and they produce sufficient energy that I have not had an electric bill for four years. They will have paid for themselves in 10 more months.

    5.Coal, oil and natural gas burning pollute vast tracts of land, causing acid rain to fall hundreds of miles form plants. Asthma rates skyrocket near fossil fuel electric generation. For example, Vermont’s forests are significant;ty affected by mid-western coal-burning plants, so much so that Vermont filed suit against them. Try traveling through West Virginia, Eastern Kentucky of the Powder River Basin in Wyoming to see what cool mining does to the landscape, and what the pollutants form coal extraction do when the runoff in rains.

    6. House cats kill more birds every year than wind generation. Once more, there is no “free lunch” on energy production. However, choosing the least damaging is essential. All competent science says that renewables are the least damaging. Read any of the UN reports on global warming.

    7. “More and more communities around the world are coming to understand that wind projects are destructive?” Really? Do you have any evidence for this statement? In the entire European Union, 15% of all electricity is generated by wind, and that number continues to grow. Have you heard anything about wholesale health problems in the European nations?