Wyoming Voters Snap Up $10,000 Renewable Energy Grants Their Senators Opposed

coal is great for winter heating, puts out more BTU
in the stove, and solar is great so long as you are rich and can afford to pay 5 X more for electricity. I like the current structure of the Senate, keeps the CA greenies from taking over my state. They love power generated in other states! Don’t like power plants in their backyards! I’ve seen what a mess the CA legislature
has made of a once great state. BROKE BUSTED UNEMPLOYED

For those of us in Wyoming we tend to not drink downstream from the herd but, then again, if we were a third world country (treated like you describe); however, if we were a country we would be one of the top ten energy producers in the world. May be we should succeed from the union? Think about that every time you turn a light.

I agree with Andrew that the political bashing detracts from the article. Stick with letting your senators and representatives know what you want regardless of their political party. Bashing will just close ears and minds.

Yes, splitting representation by state and by population was a deliberate choice by our founding fathers for balance. “US law gives a disproportionate voice to small states.” is funny. While true, I think it means the opposite of what you wanted. The small population *states* have a lower representation due to the House. The *people* in the small population states have a higher representation per capita due to the Senate. Balance.

And, for anyone who has driven through Wyoming knows, it is a leader in wind power. It would be more of a leader if there were closer large population centers to use all the power. And I’ll concede that those same drivers also know it is a leader in coal and gas also, so the change to wind will face resistance.

@Charles: How is it “bashing” to reveal the truth?

The media’s job is to tell the truth about the important things we need to know to get things done as a society.

One reason that the US is slipping behind the rest of the world in renewable power is media laziness or complicity in concealing information that a functioning democracy needs. People need to know what their Senators support. There’s not been a single vote for renewable energy from either Senator. Wyoming voters need to know that, and it would appear, they don’t.

Re: “a leader in wind power. It would be more of a leader if there were closer large population centers to use all the power. And I’ll concede that those same drivers also know it is a leader in coal and gas also, so the change to wind will face resistance.”

Yes, but the coal and gas industries got pipelines and railroads built to get that energy to population centers. But that was before we found out that greenhouse gases are making our future climate unsafe. Now that we do know that, good governance requires that we invest in transmission.

Now your Senators need to support adding wind “pipelines” to deliver all that healthy clean wind energy to population centers – and make for a secure energy future for Wyoming. All the big wind states need major transmission.

Thanks for your thoughtful comment, Andrew. I believe that we can only get what we want if we know what is impeding it.

In the case of shoring up our chance at a decent future by switching to renewable energy and energy efficiency, many things impede it, and I try to find out what they are and lay them out so we can see what we can do to change things.

There’s technological problems to find and fix (for info). Some are serious impediments like the history of Republican votes against it since 1993, but there’s desert tortoises and the people who love them more than the future of humanity, lack of access to credit by homeowners, poorly designed roofs that make many homes unfriendly to solar, laws that encouraged sprawl, the long disinformation campaign by the fossil fuel industry, etc, etc.

If you are offended, don’t be. But tell your Senator you don’t like him voting against renewable energy. If I hadn’t given you the roll call votes, you wouldn’t have known, so you couldn’t change him.

I do think legislation shapes civilizations to succeed or fail, and especially with climate change – where the invisible hand assigns no value to stopping greenhouse gases.

Thanks for your thoughtful comment, Andrew. I believe that we can only get what we want if we know what is impeding it.

In the case of shoring up our chance at a decent future by switching to renewable energy and energy efficiency, many things impede it, and I try to find out what they are and lay them out so we can see what we can do to change things.

There’s technological problems to find and fix (for info). Some are serious impediments like the history of Republican votes against it since 1993, but there’s desert tortoises and the people who love them more than the future of humanity, lack of access to credit by homeowners, poorly designed roofs that make many homes unfriendly to solar, laws that encouraged sprawl, the long disinformation campaign by the fossil fuel industry, etc, etc.

If you are offended, don’t be. But tell your Senator you don’t like him voting against renewable energy. If I hadn’t given you the roll call votes, you wouldn’t have known, so you couldn’t change him.

I do think legislation shapes civilizations to succeed or fail, and especially with climate change – where the invisible hand assigns no value to stopping greenhouse gases.

Hm, some errors in that last comment of mine that might be confusing. In the second to last paragraph, “the official in government can be trusted…” should be “the officials in government can’t be trusted…”

Also, “… from solutions to call disparagingly…” should be “…from solutions to disparagingly…”

Sorry about those.

Susan,

I really enjoy your work here on Cleantechnica. You consistently write high-quality, interesting, timely content. Thank you for all your work.

However, I disagree with the emphasis you have placed on the relative virtues of the democrats and republicans in this an other articles. Phrases such as “whose party policy as Republicans is to put up persistent obstruction to climate and renewable energy legislation” are not helpful and can alienate readers who would otherwise be eager participants in the solution to the very difficult crisis we face.

The fact is that many Americans participate in politics on the basis of meaningless identity designations like “republican,” “democrat,” “liberal,” “conservative.” These party lines accomplish nothing, and the individuals who represent those parties are all very different from one another. They are lobbied paid by different people and companies, have varied backgrounds, and some of them are actually concerned about the desires of their constituencies. Their only common trait is their label, which has become necessary because Americans are trained to think in terms of labels.

The bipartite congress is a security measure, and for that matter, the fewer people in a state, the easier it should be to convince all of them to organize for a good cause.

The changes we need will come from communities becoming conscious of their inherent power and mutual dependence on other genuine communities. Changes will also come from medium-sized companies who still rely on their costumers’ satisfaction to do business. The government is too easily controlled by large business because large corporations can hide behind subsidiaries and conventions (such as grocery stores) to mask the true nature of their operations. Governments freeze power in time, so when a big corporation like monsanto gets a former employee appointed as deputy director of the FDA, we’re stuck with them for several years. Business and community action happens in real time, and as long as transparency is promoted through competition, change can happen fast. It is fool-hardy to put any but the most reserved faith in the government to solve problems, and only distracting from solutions to call disparagingly cast blame on people who are essentially just symbols. The official in government can be trusted because there are no accounting standards, only comparative volumes of news media.

If you don’t believe me, then check out this article documenting Obama’s 1 billion dollar donation to build a “clean” coal plant (in his home state…hmmm). http://heatusa.com/blog/us-economics/clean-coal-big-boost-obama-admins-financial-commitment/

I hope this comment will further our discussion of the matter. Thanks for always working for the good.

In this particular case, the interests of a state with virtually no people in it are coal. But if the roles were reversed, and Wyoming was a leader in wind power because it was filling its huge empty spaces with wind farms, and California a leader in coal, we might be less inclined to see the Senate reorganized based on population. At this moment in history, proportional senatorial representation would work to this issue’s advantage. But is that really a reason to reorganize our political system, understanding the potential future consequences of doing so (a loss of minority voice)?

I would rather see the filibuster situation rectified, as it was never intended that one side be required to amass a super-majority to get legislation passed.

“US law gives a disproportionate voice to small states. Regardless of population, each state has two Senators, which unbalances the nation’s representation.

If the US divided its 100 Senators equally among all of its voters, rather than assigning two Senators per state, regardless of how few voters reside in the state, then it is estimated that it would be able to pass progressive policy to make the switch to renewable energy as Europe has been able to do.”

But that’s the whole point of the Senate, to give an equal voice to all states regardless of population.

We already have population based representation too, it’s called the House of Representatives.

If you just had the house then states like NY and CA would basically run the whole country and the smaller state’s interests would never be heard…

But Dave, think about it: what are the interests of a state that has virtually no people in it?

In Wyoming’s case, the major interest of that empty state is coal. So that rule has given the interest of the coal industry a much bigger voice – relative to the interests of human beings, whether in Wyoming, or in states filled with millions of us.

Kinda makes you wonder why our founding fathers put the ability to forcibly remove politicians from power as the second most important “right”, after freedom of assembly, religion and speech. Of course, they didn’t know about Apache longbows with hellfire missiles. Those who cascade over the event horizon into the black hole of greed, permanently give up the space of freedom for the squeeze of comfort.