Your May 12 editorial urging the governor and Legislature to advance onshore industrial wind energy usage in Maine again asks that government pick a winner in the race to develop “green energy” (“Legislature, governor should lead on wind”).

While your editorial is dismissive of those who oppose wind power, you overlook the salient fact that these machines are heavily subsidized by taxpayer funding, are capriciously unreliable generators of juice and blight the landscape.

If you must insist that government choose a “green energy” winner, why not back solar or tidal power? The former has the advantage of producing energy (think rooftop panels) without the need for additional transmission lines or the desecration of scenic vistas.

Among tidal power’s advantages are the constancy of tidal flow and the possibility to install small, low-impact generators along Maine’s coast.

Finally, a word about energy conservation and easy solutions. If people would simply line-dry their clothes we wouldn’t need, or even consider, industrial wind as a power source.

Sometimes, real energy solutions are just outside our doors.

 


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