Wind power
Deceptive images, messages about power
The beautiful and expensive TV ads for wind, depicting a few silent turbines in the distance nestled on green hillsides, give us warm and fuzzy feeling. Who could be against wind?
What these ads do not tell you is that the mega- industrial turbines produce the most useless and most expensive electricity.
Wind cannot replace or displace fossil fuel generation for the grid, any more than a kite can replace a jet aircraft.
Our oil-fired plants must be kept on in response to wind’s erratic nature. More usually, the plants increase their emissions because they are operated like a car in stop-and-go traffic.
Wind power is a superfluous add-on to the grid. It has zero value, and actually is pretty bad for you. What the ads don’t tell you is that these monstrous turbines do not reduce CO2, they kill birds, create low-frequency noise, health problems, ruin property values, destroy view planes, can and do cause fires, and remove from any future use tens of thousands of acres of Hawaii’s precious little land.
We are an island state, there is no more land. There are turbines being produced by CalTech’s propulsion lab right now (this is who sends our rocket ships into outer space), that are superior and use one-tenth the amount of land. They are silent, preserve view planes, can be built in small clusters and are easily removed as technology advances.
Eamil the PUC public@irpie.com as urge it to use the better technology.
Susan Osako
Lanai City
Recycling
Bottled up frustration
I object to the way I am treated at the Kealakehe bottle and can redemption center.
On Christmas Eve, I took a bag of bottles and cans from my car and placed them where I could separate them after my plan to deposit my newspapers.
I told the attendant I would be right back after I dropped off the newspapers. The attendant told me I just can’t go around leaving bags of bottles there.
He picked up the bag and placed it further aside. I again told him I would be right back after recycling the newspapers. I returned in less than two minutes and found that he had taken my bag of bottles and placed the items in the main bin, prohibiting me from getting any monetary return from them.
I object to this attitude and the way I am treated there.
It is certainly not the way a customer-service organization should treat its customers.
That place owes me $10. My next letter is to the governmental heads in Hilo (County of Hawaii solid waste facilities) but I don’t really expect any better response than I got from its employees.
Barry Willis
Kailua-Kona
Teachers
Comparing values
After the Newtown tragedy, as substitute teachers, we reflected that many teachers at our West Hawaii schools also would risk or give their lives in a similar situation.
Our community values such people, heroes who selflessly put others first. It certainly causes us to wonder just exactly how comparing students’ test scores to a mainland norm can possibly reflect the level of caring and dedication to students’ welfare that parents desire and expect from those who teach their children.
In the long run, tying teachers’ worth to test scores ignores the most important factor: the teachers’ value as hard-working, caring, contributing citizens of the community.
Ann Fraser
Q. Gwynn
Napoopoo