By Tom Dayton
While Farm Bureau policies support all types of energy and the landowner’s right to make their own choices about energy, Summit County Farm Bureau’s policy development committee presented a policy supporting the use of wind and solar power which was affirmed by the members at the 2020 annual meeting.
Solar and wind add to the energy mix and helps to lower electricity costs on the farm while lessening the dependence on fossil fuel which in Ohio is mainly coal.
Now some are at work to stymie the use of solar especially in other states by powerful players such as Warren Buffet, the Koch brothers and Duke Energy. In Nevada, Warren bought the utility and decided that solar customers were being subsidized by the rate payers in which the evidence revealed otherwise. Warren and with the support of the Governor of Nevada instituted a policy of no net metering which in effect cancelled out any credits for customers sending excess power back to the grid.
Thousands of solar installation jobs were lost that received wide media attention and so much so that a voter referendum overturned the rule and thus restored net metering and the thousands of jobs lost that outraged the voters.
In North Carolina and Florida, Buffet, the Koch brothers and Duke Energy were able to win their battle to restrict solar by using their deep pockets to publish massive amounts of disinformation to confuse voters to approve the restrictions and with it went more solar jobs.
Confusing is Buffet’s stand on increased taxation of the wealthy like him and yet he works to restrict solar undoubtedly like Duke Energy and the Koch Brothers to protect their pocket books.
Solar power is definitely cleaner and a healthier source of power than coal as utilities across the country produce 100 million tons of coal ash per year containing toxic metals in which the ash is simply buried.
Containment dams of the coal fired plants for coal ash have caused problems as there is little regulation of the state or federal government about their construction for safety.
A few years ago, Duke Energy’s dam broke resulting in a massive fish kill in a nearby river and in 2000, another coal company’s slurry dam broke destroying the homes and property of hundreds of people in West Virginia. Even with protests in Charleston, West Virginia, the company only received a $100,000 fine.
Will the public be vocal enough to thwart the will of these powerful players to restrict solar that promises more health benefits for everyone or will the powerful interests prevail.