Tilting at Windmills and the Great Northwest Land Grab

Small modular nuclear technology offers something weather dependent and land hungry wind and solar cannot provide - scalability closer to urban areas where most electricity is used.

The Horse Heaven Wind Farm (HHWF) proposed for Benton County, Washington is one step closer to making it to Governor Jay Inslee’s desk for permit approval.  Understandably, the ecological impacts of up to 222 Space-Needle-sized wind turbines are deeply concerning to Tri-Cities residents with strong opposition being registered by local interest groups and the Confederated Tribes of the Yakama Nation.

But despite overwhelming local opposition NIMBYism (“not-in-my-backyard”) cannot be allowed to prevail lectures the Colorado-based HHWF developer.  The sacrifice must be made.  After all, our motives are pure, and we are going to save the planet says the wind power lobbyists and Inslee.

While attending a United Nations climate conference in November 2022, Inslee said governments will have to overcome “nimbyism” to achieve clean-energy goals and that regulatory reforms are needed to prevent local opponents from delaying projects. “We have to confront it. We have to succeed” Inslee said.

Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, Governor Inslee’s words are the opposite of what was promised in the “Equity” section of Washington’s State Energy Strategy (SES) which declares . . . “[public] and community participation is important to ensure energy policy is informed by local knowledge, meets local needs and is viewed as legitimate by the local community”.  Additionally, “[communities] and community members must have a seat at the table in designing programs and selecting projects.”

So, despite what has been promised in the SES, majority local opposition to intrusive wind farms will never be legitimate and merely represents a hurdle that must be cleared as rapidly as possible. 

And as justification for steam rolling local interests, the governor invokes a panicked state energy strategy that proclaims Washington’s actions will contribute to “avoiding the worst impacts of climate change” while providing no rational explanation of exactly how this will occur.

Many are familiar with the idiom “tilting (or jousting) at windmills” originating from the novel Don Quixote from which we derive the word quixotic which means “foolishly impractical especially in the pursuit of ideals”. 

In a July 23rd ABC “This Week” interview Inslee said: “We knew this beast of climate change was coming for us, but now, it's pounding on the door. . . This is a solvable problem. But we need to stop using fossil fuels.”

I heard a quote recently from the late American journalist H.L. Mencken which I think provides an apt framing of Governor Inslee’s persistent and panicked climate catastrophizing: “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.”

While Inslee and countless political leaders and media figures routinely stake out scientific and moral high ground when talking about climate change, they are rarely confronted with scientific or probing moral questions from a mostly sympathetic press. 

And rather than engage in substantive discussions with those who disagree with his clean-energy plans, Inslee like countless others often resorts to the “climate- denier” label for anyone who dares question catastrophic climate change dogma. 

So here I am, call me what you want.  But I am going all in and refuse to be silent while Washington’s draconian clean-energy policies force feed an anything-goes standard so long as even a small fraction of CO2 reduction is achieved. 

I was born and raised in Benton County and our community and Yakama Nation tribal members are at risk of being forced to sacrifice a big part of our shared identity to out-of-state financial interests and clean-energy policies that promote an unwarranted and disproportionate assault on natural landscapes and open spaces.  And since science is based on observed reality, it is abundantly clear to me a ‘reality check’ is way overdue. 

Fundamental to a rational climate change discussion is knowing the concentration of CO2 in the global atmosphere is currently 417 parts per million (PPM).  This is higher than the 280 PPM just before the industrial revolution, but well below the several thousand PPM levels that have occurred over geological time scales. 

And since we all learn at a young age CO2 is life-giving plant food, it’s helpful to know plant life begins to die at less than 200 PPM and that all plant life dies at less than 150 PPM.  I am not arguing climate science.  I offer these numbers because they are ‘real’ and provide perspective and a counter to the anti-scientific CO2-is-pollution dogma.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA) and NOAA, the rate of global CO2 emissions has risen to just over 36,000 million-metric-tons (MMT) per year and will continue to rise as developing nations like China with 12,000 MMT of emissions deploy abundant, low-cost, reliable, and transportable fossil fuels to dig hundreds of millions of their citizens out of abject poverty. 

Source: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)

Data also shows U.S. total energy-related emissions have declined from around 6,000 MMT in the year 2000 to less than 5,000 MMT in 2021.  During this same period, China’s emissions rose more than 8,000 MMT.  And in 2022, China permitted two new coal power plants per week with no signs of stopping. Overall, global emissions have risen every year since the Kyoto Protocol was entered into force in 2005 except for the short period of recession in 2009, and in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

If catastrophic climate change is already happening and is directly proportionate to CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere today, then what about China and other developing nations going forward?  Are they in fact the true “existential threat” so often referred to by climate catastrophizers? 

Consider India which just surpassed China as the country with the most people while only producing 2,500 MMT of CO2 emissions.  Using China’s numbers for perspective, it appears India is poised to add thousands of MMT of CO2 in the coming decades.   

Shifting to the United States.  The primary driver of energy-related emission reductions in the U.S. has been the big switch from coal to natural gas made by electric utilities which lowered power generation emissions by more than 900 MMT between 2007 and 2021. 

Source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

But what about all the investments in wind and solar power?  After nearly two decades and many trillions of dollars of worldwide subsidies, wind and solar together only supply 2.1% and 5.6% of global and U.S. total energy respectively, with fossil fuels at 85% worldwide and 79% in the US.  Label me a heretic, but rapidly replacing fossil fuels with wind and solar is a plan detached from reality.

So where does Washington fit into reality?  According to Department of Ecology data, state emissions were 98 MMT in 2018 with 16 MMT coming from the electricity sector and 15 MMT from “Other”, including cow flatulence.  Yes, it’s in there. 

But leaving the cows out of the math, Washington’s energy-related emissions represent 1.5% of the U.S. total. And in the electricity sector Washington’s hydro-based grid represented only 0.63% of the U.S. total in 2021.

Source: https://www.epa.gov/egrid/data-explorer

Clearly, a dispassionate and realistic assessment of the data shows Washington State’s clean energy actions up to and including 100% elimination of CO2 emissions will make little difference in the U.S. inventory and clearly will not impact worldwide emissions in a measurable way well into the future: either directly or indirectly through “setting a good example”. 

Truly, does anyone really believe China and India will be influenced by how much wind and solar can be added to Washington’s hydro-based grid?  Of course not.  And besides China is too busy dominating the global supply chains for solar, wind and batteries by using energy from their low-cost and reliable coal-fired power plants to process a wide variety of minerals including 85% of rare earths.

People living in energy poverty watch their children die every day of preventable diseases and malnutrition and we will not convince poor people to stay poor.  And the indisputable reality is the globe will continue to use more energy every year for a long time to come.   

Source: Nadine Nanji, “Think Global Health - Electricity”, June 7, 2022

So, the “beast” Governor Inslee says we are fighting is being fed and is growing completely outside his or United States control, effectively becoming imaginary due to the scale and trends of global CO2 emissions.  The catastrophic CO2 “hobgoblin” used to drive an anything goes criteria and justification for siting wind projects against the will of ‘locals’ is going to continue to manifest itself whether we like it or not.

We must come to terms with this reality and slow implementation of irrational and foolish 'bumper-sticker' clean-energy policies that will hurt the poor most and possibly cripple western civilization through unaffordable and unreliable energy.  And we must stop the constant drip of highly uncertain doomsday predictions and offer a more optimistic vision that accounts for human adaptation and innovation. 

All of this to say, under a scenario where all electricity produced by Horse Heaven Wind Farm (HHWF) turbines perfectly replaces natural-gas electricity would result in around a 1 MMT per year reduction in annual CO2 emissions. 

Of course, no fair person would ask Tri-Cities residents and Yakama Nation tribal members to sacrifice their beloved Horse Heaven Hills based on such a ridiculously small number.  But we all have to chip in, right?

To add insult to injury, construction of the HHWF would not represent one of many projects planned for the state.  In fact, it’s pretty clear the HHWF would merely be a token project since Washington is not a good place for wind farms and state energy officials know it. 

According to Department of Commerce reports Washington’s clean energy vision will require importing about 43% of electricity by 2050.  And that 36% will come from wind farms in Montana and Wyoming. Of the 63,000 MW of onshore wind envisioned for the northwest (more than one-hundred Seattle-sized wind farms), Washington is only expected to host 2,000 MW or 3% of the total.

Source: Senate Environment, Energy & Technology Work Session, January 13, 2023

Electric capacity additions in Washington shown on right-side stacked bars

With that said and based on the “effective capacity” analysis completed in 2022 by the Western Resource Adequacy Program (WRAP), it’s reasonable to question why utilities would look to Washington to host any new wind farms. 

What WRAP analysis determined is Washington wind farms are expected to provide the lowest effective winter capacity than any region analyzed, by a factor of more than two to three, depending on the month.  In the worst case, utilities who add Washington wind to their portfolio will only be allowed to use 8% of the maximum generating capacity possible as credit toward their January dependable supply inventory.

So, what is a better vision?  How about an energy future of abundance and human flourishing, not one based on unprecedented land grabs, intermittency, variability, and scarcity. 

Benton PUD and more than a dozen other utilities have said yes to considering offtake of the “Site-1” small modular reactor (SMR) project envisioned by Energy Northwest and using X-Energy’s meltdown-proof and walk-away-safe technology sited near the Columbia Generating Station (CGS). 

SMR technology offers something weather dependent and land hungry wind and solar cannot provide; scalability closer to urban areas and the possibility of mitigating the need for extensive interstate high voltage transmission lines.  And Tri-Cities residents would be ecstatic to lead on new nuclear and to have the Site-1 project in our “backyard”.

So, rather than inflame the rural-urban divide by asking those of us who live in Eastern Washington and adjacent states to exclusively sacrifice for the ‘better good of humanity’, I ask everyone to look in the mirror and ask yourself what you are willing to sacrifice?  How about long held anti-nuclear sentiment rooted in outdated fears and misunderstanding?  And I ask Governor Inslee to say no to the HHWF.  It’s too close, too big, and will make too little difference to justify the sacrifices.