Last month, our friends over at the Heartland Institute published a front-page lead story in the April, 2009 edition of Environment & Climate News. Alyssia Carducci’s “Palin Energy Plan Receives High Praise” begins:

“Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) has announced an ambitious plan to produce half of the state’s electricity from renewable sources by 2025. Palin’s plan, which empowers local municipalities to identify and develop the most cost-efficient renewable power sources available to them, won immediate praise from environmental groups, consumer groups, and industry.”

This article is yet more evidence that the inexplicable conservative love affair with Sarah Palin remains unrequited—at least, when it comes to economic policy in general and energy policy in particular. But Republicans, as the kids might say, “She’s just not that into you.” Let’s examine the litany of problems with Plain’s approach to energy.…

ALBERT H. BOWERS III
NAVAL ARCHITECT & MARITIME CONSULTANT
P.O. BOX 177 – 11891 ACADEMY STREET
CHAUMONT, NY 13622
BERTNA@TWCNY.RR.COM

April 17, 2009

Senator Charles E. Schumer
Washington, D.C.

New York’s Thousand Islands are being Ruined

Dear Senator Schumer:

We need your help. We and many neighbors in surrounding communities have been concerned for the past several years about the arrival in northern New York of very aggressive developers seeking to build large industrial wind turbine facilities in our small communities. In neighboring Ontario, these large wind turbines have recently been installed on Wolfe Island, just across the river from Cape Vincent, New York. Below is a photo, taken previously, of the Tibbits Point lighthouse in Cape VIncent, marking the point where Lake Ontario flows into the St. Lawrence River:

Unfortunately, this beautiful scene will not be visible in this form again due to the construction of large wind turbines, visible in the following photo,…

INTRODUCTION

My wife and I (like many other residents) chose a retirement home in Grey Highlands because it is one of the scenic treasures of southwestern Ontario, dominated by the Niagara Escarpment, Beaver Valley, Lake Eugenia, the Saugeen River, and rolling rural countryside, woodlands, and wetlands. Now, however, the residents of Grey Highlands and the many tourists and visitors it attracts (major drivers of the local economy) are threatened with the prospect that its landscape will be blighted by 400-foot, 35-story-high industrial wind turbines that cause documented health and environmental risks, dramatically lower property values and impact one’s quality of life.

The Green Energy Act (Bill 150), now before the Ontario Legislature,  is designed to expedite this process by taking planning responsibilities away from local municipalities like ours and remitting key decisions to subsequent ministerial regulations, leaving local residents no say in matters that will dramatically impact their lives and those of future generations.…

Call it an economic train wreck, a constitutional crisis, or legslative thuggery. Litigation-driven regulation of carbon dioxide (CO2) under the Clean Air Act (CAA) is all of the above.

The Supreme Court case of Massachusetts v. EPA  (April 2, 2007) has set the stage for a policy disaster. Mass v. EPA’s second anniversary rapidly approaches, and in a Power Point presentation leaked to Greenwire last week, EPA reveals how it plans to respond to the Court. But first, some background on the case and the Pandora’s Box it has created.…