Numerous blue states have begun their very unsurprisingly quiet step to take away the rights of rural counties. Residents in these states can no longer tell large corporations that they don’t want green energy on their lands or in their communities. As green energy industries lobby away at state and local capitals, they are joined by environmentalists and their near-limitless funding sources.
So far Michigan, California, and New York have all joined forces on this issue, each passing their own legislation that takes authority from any land-use issues and takes it away from local governments. Instead, now state-supported and funded bureaucrats will be ruling with little to no idea about the area they are ruling on.
As any farmer, hunter, woodsman, or avid outdoors enthusiast can tell you, soil samples, a map, some pictures, and the words of people being paid to say they don’t tell you the whole truth about a location. In places like rural New York, the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains make windstorms far less predictable, and at times the upward lofts can be downright treacherous.
Given the fact that all three are in the top 6 for milk production, with California clearly at the top, there is clearly a secondary motive. New York and Michigan are respectively at number 5 and 6, with Wisconsin, Idaho, and Texas (respectively) filling the gap.
Edward Ring, a senior fellow and co-founder for the California Policy Institute, told the Daily Caller, “Much of the renewables business and movement has been co-opted by big corporations,” who “are spending millions” strictly through political agendas “because this is a matter of billions for them. What we are seeing, for example, with the ‘Inflation Reduction Act,’ is one of the biggest gifts of money to corporations that we have ever seen in this country.” So far, 350 communities have been able to stop them and say no.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) just signed her state’s green energy mandate which will take the state to 100% green energy generation no later than 2040. By this legislature alone the construction of solar and wind farms will need rapid expansion. Additionally, natural gas lines throughout the state will now need to have carbon capture pipelines if they wish to stay functional.
With just HB 5120 alone the Michigan Public Services Commission is now the only permit authority for any large-scale green energy project. Communities that already told these companies to kick rocks, now face the potential of these companies coming back with a vengeance. This along with other legislation effectively cripples the people of MI to serve the interests of big green business.
California was a bit ahead of them, passing their own legislation in June 2022. Done by Democratic Governor Gavin Newsome, this loafer-licking piece shoots to make the state completely green by 2045. Given the dairy production in the state, that figure will take some serious work to happen.
As Ring doubled down with his previous sentiments to the Daily Caller, the state has all but removed zoning and is now overusing emanant domain. A tool that was once invented to build things necessary for advancement like pipelines and roads, it is now being used for anything the state wants; your rights be damned. With Newsome proclaiming it’s just environmentalism, something is seriously wrong.
Back in April 2020, Governor, Democrat Andrew Cuomo formed the Office for Renewable Energy Siting (ORES) just before he left office on sexual harassment and COVID scandals. Per this unique version of screwing over NY’ers, the laws and regulations from local government that make it hard to go green don’t apply. With much of these projects going on in rural New York, the state admits they know they are stealing from them.
According to Ken Girardin, the New York-based Empire Center’s research director, much of the energy they are receiving is carbon-free. Something he claims wouldn’t exist without these programs from the state. Ironically, both Cuomo and now-Gov. Kath Hochul has received major financial donations from groups that stand to profit heavily from this legislation.
Decisions like these aren’t in the best interests of these rural residents. This land is needed for farming, growing crops, environmental management, and repurposing it for green energy ultimately destroys it. The impacts of these projects have been studied, and the impacts on birds are tremendous. Given the number of migratory birds who need these rural areas to live, this is a project that is designed to fail. It’s also one that will destroy the ecosystem faster than it fixes anything; let alone solve a single problem for residents.
