March 8, 2017
Letters, South Dakota

It’s green money

Watertown Public Opinion | March 7, 2017 | www.thepublicopinion.com

I have had a front-seat view of wind farm development for the past 10 years in South Texas and for the last few years in South Dakota.

I am seeing the economic hangover that will take place when the hundreds of wind turbines that mar our beautiful landscape wear out.

But there is more bad news.

The wind-energy developments came about as the result of a national political impulse to embrace “green energy” resulting in massive subsidies to companies engaged in building the wind farms. That, coupled with landowners trying to grasp any method to squeeze more dollars out of their land, and politicians who have an appetite for revenue to feed their spending habits, have created a fertile ground for wind-farm development.

The blades, three on each tower, cannot be recycled and – along with most of the other components – are almost exclusively manufactured overseas. Anyone who has driven on Interstate 29 the past few years has seen convoys carrying blades and other components to their temporary resting place before they end up in landfills.

At least 10 trucks are needed for each turbine and plenty of ships to bring them from Europe and Asia. This isn’t green energy; this is green money – your money filling the pockets of foreign companies, wind-farm developers, lobbyists and politicians.

As for landowners who have turned over their land to these folks for a few extra bucks, please note that you are supposed to be the stewards of the land. You don’t really own the land; it will be here when you are gone.

And so will the mess you have left behind.

Joe Jansen

Clark


URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2017/03/08/its-green-money/