Urban-rural division on wind power
www.thestar.com 22 October 2011
Re: McGuinty plugs the cabinet holes, Column, Oct. 20
Martin Regg Cohn’s column demonstrates why us peasants from the rural hinterlands have completely different mindsets and needs from our urban cousins.
The main reason most of the province outside urban areas is Tory blue is clearly its opposition to industrial wind factories. All the other items were peripheral to this issue that coalesced opposition like I’ve never seen before. The only rural residents who support industrial wind factories are land owners who directly stand to profit and a few misinformed residents who believe all the propaganda from off-shore wind factory companies and Dalton McGuinty’s Liberals.
Cohn claims “. . . polls show wind power remains broadly popular . . .”, however the majority of respondents are from urban areas who pass these wind factories on the way to their cottage and think, “How wonderful, we’re saving the planet.” They don’t have to put up with these ugly, inefficient, hazardous and expensive machines 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, forever. We do!
If urban residents feel so supportive of these machines and rural residents are firmly opposed, there seems to be a simple solution that will satisfy everyone: only build industrial wind factories where people support them, (i.e. the urban areas that voted Liberal). Voilà – a simple solution to a sensitive political headache for McGuinty.
The “shrill voices of anti-turbine protesters” will not fade away. If this government fails to acknowledge the problem it’s created with its Green Energy Act, further action can be expected.
If urban dwellers fail to see the harm they’re causing in supporting this method of producing electrons, then maybe it’s time to ramp up the opposition. Maybe a “boycott everything Toronto” program by rural residents could start the process.
Maybe it’s time to again discuss creating a province of Toronto outside of the province of Ontario. That way urban and rural issues need not become so cloudy!
Roger Nerney, Port Elgin
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2011/10/22/urban-rural-division-on-wind-power/