Fools or Liars: the sham of "100% wind"

They are either fooling themselves or lying to their customers. Hardly a week goes by without another prominent company announcing that it is suddenly "100% wind powered." Some of the companies that make the transparently ridiculous claim are Frontier Co-op and its divisions Simply Organic and Aura Cacia ("we're 100% green powered"), Tom's of Maine ("100% of our electricity consumption is powered by wind energy"), Aveda ("manufacturing with 100% certified windpower"), and Co-op America.

Like every otherwise socially conscious event, politician, and rock band that is also playing this game, all of these companies are getting the same electricity -- and paying for it -- as before. They are not buying wind energy. They are buying "renewable energy credits" (RECs), or "green tags," in addition to their regular electricity.

RECs are only the environmental packaging of the desired power. They were invented by Enron so they could sell the same energy twice. Just as they helped enrich that famously corrupt company, RECs still provide substantial gravy on a scheme for moving public funds into private bank accounts that rivals Halliburton's purchase of the U.S. presidency to start its own wars.

The fact is that RECs are free money for the likes of General Electric (the purchaser of Enron Wind), Florida Power & Light, Babcock & Brown, J.P. Morgan Chase, British Petroleum, Shell Oil, and other energy and investment giants. Not only is three-quarters of the capital costs of a wind energy facility paid for by taxpayers, not only do governments force utilities to by it, but otherwise socially and environmentally conscious people willingly give the companies even more to offset their guilt for using electricity.

They still use all that electricity, of course, but somehow they convince themselves and their customers that buying certificates for their walls is the same as not using all that electricity, or as using someone else's electricity (which that someone else pays for and uses, too).

Like the whole idea of "offsets" that allow consumers to continue consuming the same as ever -- like medieval indulgences to allow sin and enrich the church -- RECs are an obvious fraud. But when they support wind energy, they are also irresponsible.

Not only is wind energy of doubtful value in reducing the use of other fuels, it represents a massive industrialization of rural and wild places -- a heedless destruction of landscapes, the environment, and animals' (including peoples') lives. All for very little, if any, measurable benefit.

Not only are they wrong to claim they are "wind powered," industrial wind energy is incompatible with the social and environmental values that these companies claim and otherwise commendably put into practice. Let them know:

Frontier Co-op (Simply Organic, Aura Cacia)

customercare@frontiercoop.com, 1-800-669-3275

Tom's of Maine

Susan Dewhirst, Media & Public Relations Leader
sdewhirst@tomsofmaine.com, 1-800-367-8667

Aveda

1-800-644-4831, www.aveda.com/contactus/contactus.tmpl

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism, human rights, animal rights

Impacts of industrial wind

The National Research Council of the National Academies of Science today released an examination of industrial wind energy in the U.S. They want $66 for it, but PDFs are available from Endangered Species and Wetland Report and the appendices along with lower-resolution PDFs (smaller downloads) of the rest of the report from Virginia Wind.

The report is important in acknowledging the serious negative impacts of industrial wind energy development and recognizing that a proper weighing of the benefits against those adverse effects must be done. On the other hand, it perpetuates the assumption that the benefits are exactly as the industry presents them to be.

The report calls for greater study of the impacts on wildlife, the environment, and people, but unfortunately it does not call for greater study of the actual rather than the theoretical effects of wind on carbon emissions from other fuels.

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism, human rights, animal rights

No choice between birds and wind energy

In the Winter 2007 issue of Bird Scope from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, John Fitzpatrick recalls the old water-pumping windmills in the Minnesota prairies of his childhood and writes,

Even by the 1950s these inexpensive water pumps already were being eclipsed by the national power grid, which brought reliable energy to farmhouses and electric pumps even on windless days.

He then goes on to extoll the expansion of modern industrial-scale wind turbines, ignoring the obvious that he already stated: They don't provide reliable energy. They therefore won't affect carbon emissions or coal-burning. And therefore Fitzgerald's effort to balance the toll on birds and bats is delusional.

He also repeats the fallacy that the lower rpm of modern wind turbines makes them safer for birds. The rpm is lower because the rotor blades are so much longer -- a diameter of almost 300 feet (the length of a football field!) is now typical. At the tips, the blades are slicing through the air at 150-200 mph.

Instead of calling for post-installation studies to count the corpses, he should call for for a moratorium until thorough studies to determine the actual benefits of large-scale wind are done. The fact is, the evidence from Denmark is that there are little, if any, benefits to be weighed against the inevitable deaths.

Another article in the same issue describes a new effort to study the effects of man-made noise on whales. In addition to oil and gas drilling the pulsating vibrations from off-shore giant wind turbines ought to be a concern as well.

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism, animal rights

"The walls of brass contract around us"

The wind-farming industry's mechanization of great tracts of countryside is a profound tragedy, whether or not it is necessitated by the onset of global warming. Like any other extractive industry, mining the wind produces spoil heaps; in them lie foregone landscapes of fenced-off hillsides, closed paths, culverted steams, plant life bulldozed aside. This is a sudden additional encroachment of the machine world on the natural world. Ever increasingly, the old, wild, weird places become inaccessible except to the imagination. And now the sea is not inviolable. The desert isle becomes a factory in which the wind itself, no longer the spirit of freedom, is condemned to drudge like Caliban. Experience and the imagination can no longer accompany one another on the voyage to Ogygia, and both suffer and decline, the latter starved of sensory detail, the former chilled by its own indifference.

--Tim Robinson, Connemara: Listening to the Wind, 2006
(thanks to Angela Kelly of Country Guardian)

tags: wind power, wind energy, wind farms, wind turbines, environment, environmentalism, ecoanarchism, human rights

Corpse-eating at Seven Days

Suzanne "I want meat" Podhaizer, the food writer for Burlington weekly Seven Days, chose for this week's "Animal Issue" to highlight pasture-fed "beef."

While the rest of the newspaper looks at caring for, rescuing, and protecting animals both domestic and wild, Podhaizer explores the question of whether muscles cut out of dead cows who were not fattened on grain but grazed and exercised more naturally in pastures are indeed tastier.

Chip Morgan, owner of Wood Creek Farm Beef, "where the farmers process 400 head of Angus and Hereford cattle each year," sez: "We think that animals raised in a natural environment are healthier, happier and taste better."

According to Podhaizer, "Morgan describes Wood Creek as if it were a spa for steaks of the future." She irrelevantly notes that "the lucky animals get to enjoy views of the Adirondacks and Lake Champlain with their dinners." Perhaps she envied their happy lives, where "a healthy diet and lots of movement are key."

But what about being slaughtered and having her body parts drooled over and judged by other food writers? Podhaizer appears to have missed that part of the story. The Wood Creek Farm will be featured on next week's "Regeneration" show on VPT. I have a feeling they will not follow the whole process any more than Podhaizer did.

Although Morgan is to be commended for not polluting the land and waterways as much as he could, the end result is the same as on the filthiest feed lot. The animals are slaughtered (the "head" of "cattle" are "processed"). These intelligent animals are raised for a single cruel purpose: to be killed and their corpses rended and eaten.

Yet that crucial step to what Podhaizer finds so tasty is never described, let alone photographed or filmed, to enlighten readers and viewers.

tags: Vermont, ecoanarchism, animal rights, vegetarianism

Coming up in the Vermont legislature: impeachment and IRV

Impeach Bush and Cheney, already! In a surprise move, the Vermont Senate voted early Friday morning to request that U.S. Representative Peter Welch begin impeachment proceedings against the would-be emperor and his cardinal. It should be noted that there was almost no debate. It was raised. It was passed. So much for the claim from House Speaker Gaye "Simple" Symington that there's not enough time for it.

The same resolution is planned to be raised in the House by David Zuckerman, who graciously let Peter Welch run uncontested for last year. Welch ran a strongly anti-war campaign but has since voted in support of the Iraq occupation. Acting to remove the people who illegally invaded Iraq and are responsible for the death and maiming of tens of thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis might redeem that pathetic vote.

So, Vermonters! Write or call your house members! The list of their addresses, telephone numbers, and e-mail addresses is at www.leg.state.vt.us/legdir/districts.cfm?Body=H.

And in the Senate, a bill to institute instant runoff voting (IRV) for U.S. House and Senate races will be voted on next week. So write or call your senators to vote for that, too: www.leg.state.vt.us/legdir/districts.cfm?Body=S. Read about IRV and other election reforms that would move us more towards democracy at www.kirbymountain.com/rosenlake/electionreform.html.

In other legislative business, auto racers want to be exempt from the ban on the MTBE additive for gasoline. And the Progressive Party thinks it might be valid consideration. In other words, although they recognize how dangerous a pollutant MTBE is, they would shoot a huge hole in the ban on it:

"The question for Progressives is weighing the environmental concerns versus penalizing an activity who's fans are mostly working families."

It was "mostly working families" who once enjoyed occasionally lynching individuals of other working families who happened to be of African or Jewish descent (or "flatlander," maybe). And it's "mostly working families" who are poisoned by industrial chemicals that are allowed for the pleasure of a few money-making entities. How patronizing and bogus this question is! As if working families can't have environmental concerns, too. As if the activity in question is threatened by the ban on MTBE!

Vermont

Maori landscape saved from industrial wind development

Press Release from The Maori Party (New Zealand), via National Wind Watch (also see related news story):

The Maori Party has today welcomed the findings of the Environment Court in ruling against the erection of 37 turbines along Te Waka Range skyline on the Napier-Taupo Road.

“The site of the Te Waka –Titiohanga-Maungaharuru range is a distinctive feature of the Hawkes Bay” said Maori Party Co-leader, Dr Pita Sharples. “It creates an unique skyline which has great value as a landform, as a recreation resource, and a milestone landmark”.

“I am sure that the Prime Minister, as Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage would appreciate how landscapes of such exquisite beauty, feed the soul and nourish the spirit” said Dr Sharples.

“Importantly, it is also of great significance to the peoples of Ngati Tukuru of Ngati Kahungunu” said Dr Sharples. “The Maungahururu Ridge recalls the journey of the Takitimu Canoe, is a navigation aid, and a traditional source of kereru (wood pigeon).

“The naming of ‘Te Waka’ reflects its appearance as the shape of the waka on the skyline” added Dr Sharples. “There are values and stories associated with this landscape which our people hold great meaning by”.

“The land is also of special value to the Hineuru people of Tuwharetoa, the descendants of whom still occupy this land” said Dr Sharples.

“We are pleased that the relationship Ngati Kahungunu and Tuwharetoa have with their ancestral lands, waahi tapu and other taonga has been acknowledged in this decision”

The Maori Party is also pleased that the Environment Court has recognised the national importance of protecting outstanding natural features and landscapes (as required by Section 6 of the Resource Management Act 1991).

“Judge Thompson has carefully considered the adverse effects of the visual pollution that would dominate the Te Waka landscape and balanced this, and the important ancestral beliefs of mana whenua, alongside the benefits of establishing alternative energy sources” said Dr Sharples.

“These landscapes are of importance to all New Zealanders” said Dr Sharples.

“While we must all do what we can to look at renewable energy resources, the Environment Court has, on balance, respected the views of Ngati Kahungunu and Tuwharetoa, the advice of landscape specialists, and the local Hawkes Bay community in reaching their decision”.

Dr Pita Sharples, Co-leader, Maori Party

wind power, wind energy, environment, environmentalism, human rights