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Turtles take on wind turbines
Credit: BY JERRY AGAR | TORONTO SUN | August 12, 2013 | www.torontosun.com ~~
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Translate: FROM English | TO English
Turtles, not known for ferocity, have won a battle in Ontario. The battle is an important hill won in the war for a sensible energy policy in Ontario. Their enemy is a coalition of the Liberal government and radical environmentalists.
If the green energy movement wasn’t so costly and ineffective, even in its own stated purpose, it would be more amusing than it is to watch various factions try to co-ordinate their conflicting issues. That’s where the turtles come in.
In Ontario, turtle-saving environmentalists have trumped wind turbine-building environmentalists, sparking a debate over which is the “true” environmentalist.
Governments have embraced inefficient technologies and wasted billions on failed green energy products to – they say – provide a sustainable future, even though most of the results show that it costs too much and doesn’t achieve the environmental returns promised.
Across the globe, nations are realizing wind and solar promises were a lot of hot air blown in the sunshine, and are backing away from financially supporting those losing projects.
But in Canada green still holds a lot of sway with politicians.
Ontario’s Liberal government in particular has backed green energy without a care to the costs to the taxpayers and ratepayers or the communities affected by the contentious wind turbines. They have forced the turbines onto local communities with no consultation with local authorities and residents.
They believe we should accept the higher costs of wind energy with their thanks because after all, this is about cleaner air, Mother Earth and all her creatures thriving in peaceful harmony alongside the human interlopers. At least that’s their spin.
Well, there is a debate raging in Prince Edward County and the impact it might have on the Blandings Turtle. That’s right, it’s Green Power versus Turtle Power!
Now, since the turtles aren’t of the Ninja variety, they can’t fight the battle themselves, so a group of environmental conservationists fighting to stop the wind power facility won an important victory on their behalf.
Similar fights developed in the Oak Ridges Moraine and in Toronto at the Leslie Spit.
An environmental review tribunal gave the turtles precedence over a proposed field of 135-metre wind turbines in Prince Edward County.
One set of environmentalists trumped another.
Radical environmentalists don’t seem to care about people, but they do care about turtles, so perhaps that is their Achilles heel, to be sliced in the future to stop the insanity on green energy.
Ultimately, the Liberals are most interested in votes, so don’t be surprised if they declare their party as the saviour of the county, sort of the way their provincial candidate Mitzie Hunter suddenly became a champion of subways in Scarborough. It worked. She won.
Local PC MPP Todd Smith has been forcing the issue at Queen’s Park. He’s had a private members bill on the subject, hosted a town hall, asked questions in the Legislature and written countless letters to ministers demanding that they cancel the project, according to his web page.
The Liberals, meanwhile, may charge full speed ahead in trying to ram the wind project in somewhere. For the turtles’ sake, and for all of us, I hope slow and steady wins the race.
And hey, if the Liberals have to move the power project, no big deal – they have plenty of experience doing that.
— Agar is the 9 a.m. to noon host on Newstalk 1010
This article is the work of the source indicated. Any opinions expressed in it are not necessarily those of National Wind Watch.
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