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There are options with renewables

Editor, OBSERVER:

Industrial scale solar developers are targeting Chautauqua County towns making promises of riches and “green” bragging rights.

New York state is careening towards energy policies that mimic California and Texas — but those two states do not have winters like ours.

The reliability and security of the New York grid will also mimic those two states with added solar and wind. If the New York grid was modernized, the electricity output would increase by 30%. That much is lost on the outdated, faulty wires. Thirty percent is more than all proposed Western New York solar and wind.

Even if our state government is making poor energy decisions, it is possible to make corrections at a local level. Local options include:

¯ County or town law that requires recycling of solar panel components as Niagara County did last year. “Legislature finds that a convenient, safe and environmentally sound system for the recycling of photovoltaic modules, minimization of hazardous waste, and recovery of commercially valuable materials must be established.”

Mining of neodymium, dysprosium, lithium, and other rare earth metals as well as production of cobalt, megatons of copper, zinc, and other elements, use enormous amounts of diesel fuel and other hydrocarbons.

¯ Require that solar components be made in the United States. Ohio passed a law at the state level granting Ohio counties the right to veto all solar and wind projects in their respective counties. Three hundred communities in the U.S. have rejected solar and wind (Forbes).

¯ No PILOT resolution as was done for industrial wind. Home rule should allow the county to exercise their rights under state law and stop subsidies.

¯ Give towns the support they need to require their town solar law include a property value guarantee to all neighbors of solar projects.

¯ Require an accounting of electricity produced. Businesses use a cost-benefit model to determine if the value of that which is produced exceeds what is invested creating a profit. In this case the energy returned over energy invested should be assessed.

Striving for energy realism and energy humanism can begin here.

KAREN ENGSTROM,

Chautauqua

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