Kansas Takes Backward Step, as Usual

London telegraph ^ | 10/19/07 | ReasonMcLucus

[kathsua]

The State of Kansas has denied a permit to build two coal powered electric plants to Sunflower Electric.

The state of the art plants would use flue gas to grow algae which could be used for biofuels or animal feed. The complex near Garden City would include an ethanol plant. Local officials favor the plant.

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment denied the permit because of carbon dioxide emissions even though the algae would actually reduce CO2 emissions.

The denial won't adversely affect growth in the Kansas economy because the Kansas economy isn't growing that much anyway and the situation isn't likely to change in the future. Most of the electricity the plants would produce would be sold to users in other states.

The move demonstrates one of the dangers of the nonsense about magical greenhouse gases. The U.S. has an abundance of coal and using it can reduce the nation's dependence on foreign fuel. Limiting construction of electric plants will limit the potential for electric cars and possible future growth in the U.S. economy .

The American coal industry needs to take a more active role in dispelling the myth of greenhouse gases if it wants to increase its business. Electric companies also need to challenge this myth.

Part of the tragedy of the denial of a permit to new clean plants is that electric companies cannot use the new capacity to allow the closing of old dirty plants as described in one of the comments below. If Kansas were a forward looking state, it would realize that the Sunflower plants provide the best way to clean up the environment. Those who believe in magical greenhouse gases should want to encourage electric utilities to switch to the type of plants Sunflower wants to construct instead of telling utilities government prefers the old dirty plants.

[kathsua]

The plant would use carbon dioxide to grow algae, but the state vetoed it because it would produce carbon dioxide. Apparently there are no real pollution problems with the plant or the state would have used such pollution to block the plant. Kansas is definitely a dumb state.

[the_devils_advocate_666]

No need to worry, they are already building plenty of coal fired electric plants right now... in China.

[Ken522]

There are plenty of smart people in Kansas ... it seems like the farther they go from the farm, the more stupid they become.

[Slapshot68]

Thanks to the GW lemmings, coal is a bad word now...even if there would be no CO2 emission.

By the way, don’t you hate it that CO2 is now classified as pollution? Without CO2, there would be no replenishable form of oxygen (photosynthesis).

[Slapshot68]

Thanks to the GW lemmings, coal is a bad word now...even if there would be no CO2 emission.

By the way, don’t you hate it that CO2 is now classified as pollution? Without CO2, there would be no replenishable form of oxygen (photosynthesis).

[Resolute Conservative]

What is going on in Kansas? I thought it was a solid red state. I saw a story the other day where the Methodist Conference in Kansas voted to change the Book of Discipline to remove the condemnation of homosexuality and some other things.

[caisson71]

The Green agenda is well financed. It has bought the majority of politicians. When politics disregards common sense, follow the money.

[A Cyrenian]

I love your headline.

Concise, direct, very well thought out.

Good job.

[ozzymandus]

City people in KS are just as stupid as city people anywhere else. Even the small towns have a far-left fringe, even if it’s only a few noisy clowns, usually with government jobs. A proposed wind farm in this area was recently defeated by a handful of NIMBY yuppies who managed to intimidate a single county commisioner into vetoing the project, even though it was nowhere his part of the county.

[Paleo Conservative]

How is using up an aquifer that is not being recharged in order go grow crops to be converted into fuels in any way considered to be “renewable”?

[no-no bad dog]

One thing to keep in mind is this “most of the electricity the plants would produce would be sold to users in other states.” This is nothing more than the front range wanting the electricty but not the headaches that come from trying to build a coal fired power plant. Also I heard that natural gas providers were lobbying hard against the coal plants so that they would have to go with natural gas. Not much coal in southwest Kansas but there is a lot of natural gas. Its real simple, if you think coal powered plants are just great and you need the juice, put one in your backyard. I watched the wind farm proposal that I think your talking about (Ellis Co.?) I heard there is a farm going in around Ellsworth.

[Concho]

You have to study the demographics. More than half the people in the state live in 4 eastern counties. Most of them are Democrat.

You also have to study that Sebelius is sucking up to Hillary hoping for the vice nomination if Hillary gets picked. Therefore she has her henchmen out killing anything that is not green to suck up to Hillary, even if it means cutting the throat of the states economy.

[Concho]

Yes, I was reading the letters to the editor in the Hays paper. You would think that you had picked up a San Francisco paper. Those people lost their minds. It was a case, that if I cant have it, then nobody is going to have it.

In both cases, it was wackos from Lawrence and Topeka who put a stop to both projects.

[ozzymandus]

There was another factor in the Ellis Co. wind farm that didn’t get much publicity. Most of the opponents were fairly well-to-do types that had built homes near the proposed site of the wind farm. They got the land cheap because it’s worthless rocks and hills with very little water, can’t be farmed and isn’t even fit to raise cattle on. They made all sorts of outrageous and slanderous claims about the company which was based in Spain, trying to make people think the electricity would be exported (to Spain!), and the landowners who would profit from allowing turbines on their land. The NIMBYs finally got to one county commissioner who vetoed the project, but it still may be back.

The funniest thing was when the lead NIMBY wrote a letter calling the editor of the paper a “Fascist”, when the editor is a typical MSM leftie, who allowed the same NIMBY to run a letter in the paper almost every day, personally trashing the landowners with crude insults and accusations of criminality.

[Concho]

There was one female who persisted with the psychobabble, quoting French research about how the turning blades were going to interfere with her TV reception, and how the radiation from the generators would microwave anyone within a mile and a half of the generators. I say Hell yes, Ellis county doesnt need the industry, I have a perfect place for it just outside Ellis County. Put it on my land, I’ll laugh all the way to the bank. I dont have to deal with the likes of the Ellis County Commissioners on my property. I’ll move back to Kansas for that!!!

[kathsua]

Right, although many of them masquerade as REpublicans until a real REpublican is nominated and then they admit they are Democrats like the current Attorney General

[Concho]

Lon Wartman just pulled the plug over that didn’t he? I received a letter from one of the guys at Sunflower that had a copy of his letter to the Kansas State Democratic Committee.

[ozzymandus]

One woman wrote a letter to the editor claiming that her husband had a sinus infection and his doctor said the windmills would kill him. The main opponent (the guy who called the editor a “fascist”) is a Canadian immigrant with a government job in Ellis county, who quoted bogus and outdated “studies” from all over the world about the supposed effects of turbines. He also made a public $1000 bet with a landowner, that a weather tower erected by the power company was 800 feet high. It turned out to be 400 feet high, but the NIMBY welched on the bet, saying the power company had secretly cut off half the pole at night, and he had pictures to proove it, but they weren’t “ready” yet. Jeeze. I own land in Graham and Phillips counties, and I’d love to have some wind turbines on my land. The Quinter high school recently installed a turbine on their property, saying it would pay for itself in 5 years, and provide free electricity for 25 years after that. The dean of FHSU, in Hays, has had plans drawn up for turbines to help power the campus. I don’t think the idiots will be able to hold back progress forever.