Do North Carolina Republicans In Favor of More Air Pollution – Apparently So

An Unbelievable but Apparently True Story

A $400 milion wind generation facility is about to go on line in eastern North Carolina except Republican legislators in that state want to stop it.  Really.

 “North Carolina legislators want the incoming Trump administration to shut down a nearly complete, $400 million wind farm they believe poses a national security threat because it’s too close to a long-distance surveillance radar installation.

Ten legislators including the leaders of the state House and Senate signed a letter sent to President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team, House Speaker Tim Moore’s spokesman Joseph Kyzer said Thursday.

The legislators said they worry that the 300-foot-tall wind turbine towers with blades nearly 200 feet long will interfere with a long-distance Navy radar installation in nearby Chesapeake, Va. The radar system scans hundreds of miles into the Atlantic and Caribbean for ships and planes.

The wind farm is on about 20,000 acres in rural northeastern North Carolina near Elizabeth City, an area with some of the best on-land wind potential on the East Coast.

The legislative opposition comes after all 104 towers have been constructed, about $400 million has been invested and full commercial electricity production is weeks away, said Paul Copleman, a spokesman for Avangrid Renewables, a U.S. subsidiary of Spanish clean-energy giant Iberdrola S.A.

Amazon will buy the electricity output, comparable to the power 60,000 U.S. homes use in a year, to run its Virginia data centers.”

Yes, ten legislators who are totally and completely ignorant on the subject want to over-rule DOD just because they hate non-polluting wind energy and want the pollution that comes with coal burning.  Of course all safeguards are in place.

“A 2014 agreement between Avangrid and the Navy said that although there is potential for conflict between the wind farm and the radar array, the Pentagon also sought to enhance the country’s renewable energy resources. The agreement specified placement of the project’s wind turbines and an understanding that the company would curtail operations “for a national security or defense purpose.”

“If the wind farm threatened any military readiness or capabilities, they wouldn’t have cleared us to build,” Copleman said in an email. “Specifically at this site, we reduced the size of the project, arranged specific turbines differently, ran extensive modeling in conjunction with their scientists, and will continue to share operating data once we reach full commercial operation.”

Of course the Neanderthal legislators explain how the project got military approval.

But the lawmakers’ letter said the Pentagon dropped opposition to the wind farm because of the “political correctness” of outgoing President Barack Obama’s administration.

Somebody needs to tells these people that clean air is not political correctness, it is necessary for life.  And the rest of us want everyone to live pollution free, even these idiots.