Alternative energy

Just for the record, I’m not “on board” for any kind of industrial-sized wind turbines. Not now. Not ever. Not anywhere and most especially, not here in the County. I am, as regards IWTs, a full-on NIMBY and have as many questions about the “green and clean” of IWTs. And, also for the record, I don’t often thank folks for their suggestions, but I thank my “snappy” neighbour for suggesting I should spend a night on Wolfe Island under one of the 86 industrial wind turbines. I don’t think he meant it “for my enjoyment” and wonder if, in fact, he understood what I was saying about the absurdity of IWTs. Maybe. Maybe not.

My point was and is, there has got to be a better way than fields of massive IWTs or hulking nuclear power stations or carbon spewing, oil and coal-fired generators. I said it two weeks ago and I’ll say it again, wind and solar seem to be the way to go. But, as regards the development of wind energy technology, we are still in the great, big honking boombox years of development and have a long way to go until we reach the MP3 era.

Size, obviously, makes a difference—in the enjoyment of sound and in energy generation. And I still truly believe the better way starts in our own homes and businesses with conservation and forward planning. But I fear if we, as consumers, get really serious about reducing our own rate of energy consumption (natural gas, electric, oil, coal, etc.), we will likely end up paying an outrageous price for any we take from the grid. Either way, I believe our governments have an agenda for IWTs, in particular, and other forms of alternative power generation and it isn’t an agenda formulated to consider the best, long-term interests of residential and small business energy consumers.

We live in a very plugged-in world. It wasn’t too long ago when my family had an icebox in the kitchen. Okay, it was about 60 years ago. The ice was cut in the winter, stored and delivered to 1950s holdouts like my parents, and no, I sure as H E doubledoored- energy-star-rated fridge, don’t own an icebox. Like all y’all, I’ve got the same energy sucking appliances on my counter and have as much trouble as you to remember to turn out the lights when I leave a room. And I just can’t imagine not having my power-cake and eating it too. I have become accustomed to low cost energy, even though the cost of “hydro” has escalated in the last two or three years, we surely do have lowcost energy. If you don’t believe me, just check out the cost of fuelling a home in Europe. We’re all accustomed to flipping a switch and powering up our lives without too much thought about the real cost. Believe it or not, it was purely with tongue in cheek I suggested moving the IWT project to Picton or, as some of you might have believed, let the project go ahead at Ostrander Point. I’m not that kind of girl.

I do know our current provincial and federal governments do not have a wellthought- out plan we can trust because their plans aren’t really and truly about clean, sustainable, alternative forms of energy. Their plans are all about big business. Maybe the County could start talking about independence from the Ontario grid as part this community’s forward plan—a strategic plan for renewable energy. Ya, a solar panel or two on Shire Hall and if it weren’t for the carbon dioxide, I’d suggest they could burn some of their biomass.

theresa@wellingtontimes.ca