why destroy great green energy source 101910

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Why destroy a great green energy source?

I saw an article in the Wall Street Journal not long ago that was a surprise. It had a color of a river and a nearby lake and said that hydroelectric power is making a comeback as the cheapest source of green energy and one of the cheapest for any kind of energy.

According to the article, hydroelectric power is being built in a number of states and planned in many others, including some where the water is pumped from a nearby river to a lake, where power is generated.

It struck me that, while it’s making a comeback in the United States (California has a big program for building dams coming up), Oregon wants to blow them up — the four dams on the Klamath River near here. And a woodburning plant is planned to replace them.

That seems like a bad idea, and putting the biomass plant near a city is worse. It should be out in the forest, where the smoke and trucking will bother nobody and where the wood is, if done at all.

But why do it? Blowing up a dam to get rid of algae or permit fish passage is silly.

We need green, constant energy and we need to store water. Blowing up things is a poor way to create jobs. We could tax the casinos for this and make them provide water storage. We don’t want Klamath Falls smelling like a pulp mill.

From what I have read, a biomass plant will make both air and water quality worse and cost millions. Who will pay for replacement water storage? Us?

Who is going to pay for all of this, including blowing up dams and building a biomass plant if not us? I doubt that the Indians or industrialists or bankers or lawyers will pay for it.

Henry Edwards

Klamath Falls