The New Hampshire State Supreme Court has sided with the Site Evaluation Committee’s rejection of Northern Pass. If the committee has that authority under law, then that’s the right call. But while some factions are cheering, this is indicative of a serious issue.
We need to power the state, and my confidence in our commitment to that is low.
I admit I am not as familiar with Northern Pass as I should be – stayed away from that one. But it is representative of the more significant problem. The “serious issue” we have here in the Granite State. It feels like we are on a declining arc for reliable on-demand energy in New Hampshire.
Every effort to create infrastructure is blocked or dragged through the courts until it becomes untenable.
We keep closing power plants, and the answer is never going to be biomass, wind, and solar, unless the question is, “how do ensure our status as a third world state surrounded by Western culture.”
Modern life requires energy on demand at prices ordinary people can afford.
Even if you insist on making us pay more for energy from woodchips, sunshine and breezy days (ignoring that you probably have to cover the whole state with turbines and solar panels) you have to allow gas pipelines for back up facilities or half of the year the land will be mostly uninhabitable. None of it very affordable.
No one is going to run a business here. Tourism will be virtually impossible to sustain.
We won’t even have enough energy to properly husband the encroaching wilderness, let alone care for veterans, the elderly, the sacred mental health waiting list, or the most vulnerable; which will be everyone who stays and can’t afford their power plant.
Who am I kidding? We’ll be burning everything that grows.
The bears will complain about people wandering into their “backyards.”
You can’t run a state like this.
Either build another nuclear plant or make a deal that supplies hydro to New Hampshire instead of through New Hampshire. Build a pipeline for natural gas so New England won’t have to buy it from Africa and Asia.
What’s the plan people? Stop bitching about broadband for the North country and think about how we’ll power the damn thing.
You can’t NIMBY us into the 18th century. A place where we won’t even be able to power the “commuter rail” reliably so we can get to our horse and buggy to take us back to the cabin in the woods.
Or maybe you can.
