April 19, 2008
Letters, West Virginia

Money vs. energy

If the providers of wind projects are so magnanimous and are so eager to save us from “the energy crisis,” why did the applications for wind farms drop 93 percent when it was thought the U.S. government was not going to extend the green tax credits beyond 2008? It is very evident that they are only interested in the money they will get for the tax credits and not their desire to provide a green energy source – a source which provides very little energy and relies on our existing reliable energy for its failure during times of low wind or very high wind.

These providers of wind projects will situate them near existing transmission lines because they are responsible for providing transmission lines where none exist, and they are unwilling to pay the $1.5 million per mile that it costs to build the lines. That is why you do not see them on the plains of rural, central states where transmission lines are very scarce, but where there is an abundance of wind. We in Barbour and Randolph counties will be liable for payment for any changes to lines or substations by our increased utility rates.

I have seen the undated DVD provided to the West Virginia Public Service Commission on March 25 on behalf of AES, which shows scenes from the U.K. If one looks closely, one will notice that the scenes are all of level areas, or scenes at or in the water. No scenes are shown where there is the destruction of forests such as we have in Barbour and Randolph counties. Our forests absorb emissions and provide oxygen and are themselves “clean air machines.” The U.K., Germany and the Netherlands are rethinking their use of wind power because it is not offsetting the use of their natural power sources as they believed it would.

It would seem that the advent of the Integrated Combined Cycle Gas (ICCG) concept to be built in Mason County to provide cleaner burning coal which will use our own natural resource would be a much better source of green energy and would not destroy our forests or provide long term revenue for out-of-state entrepreneurs.

As one other protester wrote: “Check the litigation issues of AES in the Dominican Republic, and the country of Georgia before acting on this issue.”

Norman Arbogast

Belington