Good Morning Gentle Readers,
The same people who scream bloody murder when somebody wants to build a home on the ridgeline in Laguna Beach or who drown the local planning commission in outrage because somebody wants to put up a cell tower disguised as a fake tree often applaud this kind of crap.
When Captain John, the Four Winds snorkel boat pilot, opined that it was about time Maui used it's gale force wind tunnel for something other than proving that Maalaea Harbor is the world's windiest harbor, TWC opined that these wind mills were uglier than dog poop. The heavy set woman thought I was obnoxious and claimed that they weren't as ugly as smog (a debatable point to be sure).
Will Rogers once said that you should never miss a good chance to shut up. Mrs TWC is on that boat and at the behest of her pointed elbow jabs, I shut up and smiled before I could point out that Maui doesn't have any smog and burning fossil fuels to provide electricity is certainly less irritating to the eyes, nose, and lungs than the ritual burning of used sugar cane in the valley that one can smell all the way to Kaanapali Beach.
Yes, we have those detestable windmills in Californicate as well. Cabazon, a hellish place at the edge of the desert that would be hard pressed to get any uglier, is filled with them and has been for years.
Of late, certain Eco-facist organizations have begun to oppose windmills because they kill birds. They're so repulsively ugly that the tiny bird hearts stop beating and the birds then fall to certain death. The Sierra Club isn't among those and recently filed suit against the Pentagon for delays in approvals of wind farms.
I might also point out that it is illegal for TWC to install an old fashioned nostalgic windmill to pump water. You've seen them before and they were a common sight across rural America fifty years ago. But the county and the neighbors deem them too ugly to be allowed at Casa de las Rocas Grande.
The windmills are a maintennance headache. Hundreds of them in Cabazon don't work and the ground beneath them is littered with parts and other debris that has fallen or blown off the windmill. Not too likely to get fixed either since the investment pools, limited partnerships, & tax shelters that jumped in initially have milked all of the tax credits and subsidies out of the deal and have no further incentives. It is fairly apparent that absent fat government subsidies and tax credits, wind farms wouldn't exist at all because they simply are not economically viable.
And finally, to reach the goal of providing 5% of US energy needs by 2020 using wind power we need 132,000 more of these 300 foot tall behemoths with wing spans approaching 175 feet. How about one in your backyard?
As Ever,
TWC
Aloha Gentle Readers,
