February 10, 2018
Letters, New York

Disruption of water source is not green

Opinion: Disruption of water source is not green, says Hopkinton resident | North Country Now | February 9, 2018 | northcountrynow.com

The sugar maples, our state tree, average 60-75 feet tall, which is easily twice the height of the buildings in my town. From these two facts alone, can you picture the Town of Hopkinton in your mind? The industrial wind turbines proposed for our area are 500 feet tall.

Comprehending scale, Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson explains, “there are more molecules of water in a cup of water than there are cups of water in all the oceans of the world. Any cup of water that passes through your kidneys and comes out of your body, which it will do, (contains) enough water molecules to scatter into every other possible cup that someone can consume in the world and, give it time, it will scatter to the rest of the world.

This means that for every cup of water you drink it very likely has molecules of water that passed through the kidneys of Genghis Khan, of Jesus, of Abe Lincoln. Pick your favorite historical character and you are consuming water molecules that passed through their digestive tract.”

It is indeed mind-boggling how small a water molecule is and yet how profoundly essential. At negative 29F last month, I was amazed to watch water bubbling up out of the springs in Hopkinton’s highest ground where I live in Catherinesville. Hopkinton’s high ground sponge is a source for two drainages of the St. Regis River. Springs become brooks…rivers…oceans.

Hello, Stockholm. Hello, Brasher. Hello, Mohawk Reservation. If I were to dump a bunch of PCBs in these springs it would poison everything downstream as well as the ground waters. And I feel I should have every right to do this because I own the land and can do what I want on it. I’m the taxpayer.

In stark contrast to Hopkinton’s precious gift of natural spring waters is Cape Town, South Africa, (population 3,740,026 at last count), now in the midst of a water crisis where they could soon be completely out of water. In this light I do not think they would be so cavalier as to industrialize their water sources, but…maybe they did.

The magnitude of one industrial wind turbine is an astounding feat of engineering which does not merit their construction. As you will recall, it was engineers who designed the ovens at Dachau so we must never forget the difference between ‘can’ and ‘should’. They have warned us and I believe them. I believe those people who have suffered in various ways from industrial wind and who speak out in an effort to save us from the same fate.

It is a shame if you do not believe we are all worth protecting, and that includes the plants, the animals, and our precious water supply. I am not an environmentalist because I do not get paid to have an opinion, but I care a great deal about nature. Disruption and/or contamination of water sources is not clean. Subsidy mining is not green. And the only renewable component about industrial wind is the foreign leases on American land.

I know more now about industrial wind than I ever wanted to know and with that comes the realization that I don’t know the half of it. I hope you are so enlightened. It is very, very quiet out here in the woods of Hopkinton. It is the perfect spot for a crime.