By Marita Noon
Sunday, August 18, 2013
The power plant closures are coming; the power plant
closures are coming; the power plant closures are coming; and while no one is
riding through town to announce the news, the results to America could be
nearly as dire as the coming of the Redcoats. Despite millions already spent on
modifications, fully functional coal-fueled power plants are being shut
down—not because they are not needed but due to ideology. In fact, the Energy
Information Administration predicts that electricity demand will continue to
grow 0.9 percent per year until 2040 as we plug in to electricity that is
becoming increasingly expensive.
One such example is the San Juan Generating Station in
New Mexico’s Four Corners area that provides about 60 percent of PNM’s (New
Mexico’s primary electricity provider) total electric generation in the state.
The coal-fueled plant has four generating units—two of which are being shut
down due to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations. The Albuquerque
Journal reports that there will be “rate hikes to allow PNM to recover costs
associated with the changes at San Juan.”
The San Juan Generating Station is scheduled for closure
in 2017, but the process of replacing the 340 megawatts that will be lost has
already started. PNM wants to fill the need with a new natural-gas plant at the
same site and by bringing in more nuclear power from the Palo Verde Generating
Station in Arizona, in which PNM is already part owner. Environmentalists
oppose PNM’s plan and are pushing for more renewables such as wind and
solar—which will “drive costs way up.”
But the problem with renewables isn’t just the cost or
the intermittency. The problem is that environmentalists also oppose what it
takes to get the natural resources needed to build, for example, a wind
turbine.
The Northwest Mining Association, lists the metals and
minerals needed to build one 3 megawatt wind turbine, which includes: 335 tons
of steel and 4.7 tons of copper. (To replace the 340 megawatts of electricity
generated at San Juan with wind would take 113 three-megawatt wind turbines—or
37,855 tons of steel and 1598 tons of copper.) Most people don’t think about
where the metals and minerals come from or what it takes to recover or shape
them.
Steel is an iron-based alloy that requires coal in the
production process. It takes about 400 pounds of coal to produce a ton of
steel. Unfortunately, the Obama administration—which is closely aligned with
the environmentalists’ agenda—doesn’t seem to understand this. They are pushing
for more wind turbines—with Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewel, “gearing up
to make offshore wind energy a hallmark of her tenure,” according to the
Washington Post. At the same time, environmentalists are coal’s adversaries.
Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV), following an August 1 meeting with EPA
administrator Gina McCarthy and White House legislative affairs director
Michael Rodriguez, stated: “You cannot describe this any differently than as a
war on coal, and not just in West Virginia or the U.S. but on a global scale.
They’re using every tool they have to destroy the most abundant, reliable and
affordable resource that we have.”
In Wisconsin, a company has begun soil testing with the
goal of mining iron ore in a four-mile open pit mine. Gogebic Taconite, or
G-Tec, has begun exploratory drilling and is gathering samples to send to
government agencies. If results show the process is safe, G-Tec will be allowed
to go ahead with its plans to construct the mine in a region where mining was
once the main source of revenue. “Many of those who live in the economically
depressed towns nearby,” many of them are descendants of miners, according to a
Fox News report: “support the company’s efforts and look forward to the
potential for much-needed jobs and growth in the region.” Yet, environmentalists
are intent on blocking the project and have gone to such extremes as death
threats, destroying equipment, attacking workers, and barricading roads.
An attempt to mine copper in Alaska is facing similar
opposition—albeit this time through the EPA rather than acts of eco-terrorism.
The proposed Pebble mine would potentially bring up to $180 million in annual
taxes and revenues to the state of Alaska. A mine plan has not been put
forward, nor have the companies behind the Pebble Partnership begun the permitting
process, but the EPA has spent more than $2 million in an unnecessary and
controversial draft watershed assessment of the Pebble Mine. According to the
Daily Caller, the EPA and environmental groups argue that the agency has the
authority to preemptively veto a permit. The Pebble Partnership has spent ten
years and more than $400 million in research, studies, and fieldwork but has
not yet submitted any plan. Frances Beinecke, president of the Natural
Resources Defense Council reports that Pebble Mine opponents urged the EPA to
conduct the assessment. She states: “The EPA has the authority under the Clean
Water Act to stop Pebble Mine.”
Abraham Williams, president of the pro-development
nonprofit Nuna Resources, says environmental groups are active in the region.
“They have people on the ground and they move around the communities very well.
They are well funded. It’s amazing. They are like ants—they work everywhere.”
The war on coal, the proposed G-Tec iron ore mine in
Wisconsin and on the proposed Pebble Partnership copper mine in Alaska are just
a few examples of environmental opposition to extracting the metals and
minerals that are needed to build the wind turbines they want installed in New
Mexico—and throughout the US.
With the volume of power plants scheduled to be shut down
in the next few years—nearly 300—and the combination of opposition
environmentalists have to any form of electricity generation that is effective,
efficient and economical, and their opposition to mining what is needed to build
the renewables they want—only one conclusion can be made: environmentalists
want you powerless.
When Paul Revere made his famous ride announcing that the
British were coming, the pending battle was over high taxes, and the
consequences threatened America’s future independence. Likewise, today the
battle is over higher-cost electricity which impacts all aspects of modern life
and threatens America’s economic independence.
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