This issue is an example of our parochial and poorly educated approach to energy and environmental issues. Wake up, DFL!
The Riverside plant burns coal to make electricity. Mayor Rybak wants this changed -- we should burn natural gas, which is cleaner by far. Of course DFLers who support McLaughlin seem to think that the big problem here is that we are moving too slowly. Here's the real issue, which neither DFL faction cares to know about (or is it knows to care about?). We import large amounts of natural gas from Canada. Canadians send the USA about 55% of the crude oil they produce and about 68% of natural gas. The fine print of NAFTA locks Canada and Mexico into exporting at least as great a percentage of this fossil fuel to the USA even as they reach peak and will need to import from other countries to supply their own needs. Many Canadians are angry about the high-handed way we energy-guzzling Americans assume that we can demand their resources even if they need them at home. (The USA and Canada have a little problem with lumber, too, but for now that's a different story.) More than half of our homes are heated using natural gas. Many businesses use natural gas furnaces as well. Some people believe that we are stupid to burn natural gas when it is so useful as a feedstock to make fertilizer and other very useful products. So our local DFLers want to burn natural gas to make electricity. Natural gas will become more expensive, and may give us a harder and more drastic energy crunch than petroleum. Electricity will biome more expensive as well if we burn natural gas to burn it. If Canadians and Mexicans and other folks from Central America and South America decide to lower the flow of fossil fuels to the USA in order to bargain for a better deal for themselves (it's a free market, free trade and all that, right?) then we are up a crick without a paddle. The latest, excellent summary of this issue I've found is here online: http://www.fcnp.com/535/peakoil.htm I continue to be amazed at how upset DFLers get with people who oppose their favorite flavor of DFLer for Mayor or City Council. We need local government representatives who are willing to do their homework and plan infrastructure for the next twenty or thirty years. We need to look at how much energy we can generate here in our bioregion, and create an energy budget which will require us to import far less energy than we do. Minneapolis, the Metro Area, and our state are a part of a bioregion. We need to learn to live within our energy means. By the way, we also import electricity from Manitoba Hydro. This Canadian project has been devastating for many Native People who have been displaced by the project. Once again, a colonial arrangement: we suck energy in without thought for how it gets to us. check out the documentary website for Green Green Water. http://www.greengreenwater.com/vlog/ In ten years we will see increasing tension over scarcening supplies of petroleum, natural gas, and even water. Prices will go up. Those who realize that we in the USA exclude them from our banquet will become hopeless and full of rage. As we become more brutal in order to maintain the status quo for a shrinking minority of wealthy people, civil unrest will grow here in the "homeland." Rybak and McLaughlin are afraid to address these issues because their political base refuses to do so. We need to educate ourselves out of the paralysis we have chosen in the face of challenging times. Mayoral and City Council Candidates must help create a plan to transform Minneapolis into a sustainable city. So far, neither one has made even one point stick in their campaign mudfight. Tweedle-dumb and tweedle-dee. Please pass the coal, petroleum, and natural gas. And a heaping helping of nuclear power as well, please. And so it goes.....politics as usual in the local DFL....and so it goes..... pedaling for peace and ecojustice from Lynnhurst for now - Gary Hoover REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[email protected] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
