We are all familiar with the NIMBY principle: "Not In My Backyard." It's commonly found among leftists and environmental activists - but I repeat myself - who are all in favor of massive, ugly, bird-killing windmills and solar plants, as long as they don't have to see them. These folks use environmental and zoning laws and regulations to fight these projects while pushing to have them foisted on the rest of us.
Now, though, some of these people are learning that the very environmental rules and regulations they pushed for are proving to be a double-edged sword.
And it's the American Native communities that are leading that charge.
In a bit of irony, the very legal and regulatory obstacles the Greens erected and deployed against fossil fuel companies they were opposed to are now coming back full circle to explode in their faces, blocking and hindering their beloved solar and wind projects. Even more poetically just, it has often been the “little guys” environmentalists have insisted they care so deeply about who are the ones wielding the weapons.
Energy expert and journalist Robert Bryce notes that farming families, small rural communities and Native American Tribes have rejected or restricted 35 wind and 58 solar projects this year, through September. Since 2015, these “little guys” have stymied a whopping 735 “renewable energy” projects across the USA.
Good. That's how things are supposed to work. We are concerned with the environment, yes - we're the folks who actually live out in "the environment," which back in the day we called "the country." We, not urban leftists, are the ones who will have to look at these huge installations. We, not climate scolds, are the ones who see the bird kills, the piles of used windmill blades, and the acres on acres of usable land given over to solar plants.
These things are being built where we live - not where the climate scolds live. So if some folks are using the climate scold's own methods against them, fine.
Rural and coastal communities know those installations will be in their backyards. They apparently don’t want them impacting croplands and habitats, ruining scenic vistas, pummeling property values, killing birds and other wildlife – and creating major fire and toxic gas risks from lithium-ion electricity storage batteries.
Who could blame them? The bad news for the Greens is these locals are challenging their beloved “climate-friendly” projects, using the environmentalists’ own legal roadmaps … and winning.
This is the Way.
See Related: Blocking Wind and Solar Power Projects: A Growing Trend Among US Counties
California: Climate Groups Push to Stop Re-Licensing of Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant
West Hollywood Progressives: 'We Need Affordable Housing...but Not Where We Can See It!'
This is actually a rather delicious turn of events. There are places, yes, where some of these methods are practical; we have friends up here in the Great Land who are off-grid, and while at least half the year they are heavily reliant on a diesel generator and battery, in summer their solar panels power their houses and outbuildings rather nicely. Solar, it turns out, works best when there is sunlight 20 hours a day. We have other friends with solar panels who make enough energy from May to August to pay for the electricity they draw from the grid for the rest of the year.
But there are some dramatic differences between those folks and the big, industrial-scale installations the climate scolds advocate. First, these people chose to have the installations and paid for them; second, they are limited in scale, not taking up acres of land; and third, and finally, they are on private property.
And as far as solar in particular goes, most of the country doesn't get sunlight like an Alaskan summer.
Finally, as I keep pointing out, it's about energy density. It's always about energy density. If the climate scolds understood that and still wanted clean, carbon-free energy, they would be advocating for nuclear power.
Here's what it all boils down to:
Case in point, Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird recently sued a waste disposal company for failing to cut up, transport, recycle and otherwise properly dispose of 1,300 broken and decommissioned wind turbine blades, which the company simply left piled up at multiple locations across the state.
As green ventures collapse, there’s a reckoning environmentalists must come to grips with – they no longer have the public trust. They will have to make their case to state and local officials who, to quote Shakespeare, will determine whether green energy projects are “to be, or not to be.” This may become much more difficult to do.
Sometimes the climate activists' own agendas can circle back (ha!) and bite them on their fourth point of contact. This is one of those times.
