by repost
Thursday, Oct. 09, 2008 at 11:52 AM
The control of scarce resources is a time-tested method of concentrating wealth and power. Although renewable energy resources are not scarce, the paradigm shift in public understanding about the fundamental differences between renewables and fossil fuels is only beginning. By subsidizing the building massive permanent infrastructure to control the collection and distribution of renewable energy, Proposition 7 will starve investment in distributed renewables needed to democratize the energy economy. Meanwhile, that centralized, permanent infrastructure will provide profit centers for a few corporations at the expense of everyone else.
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California Proposition 7:
Redefining Renewable Energy to Concentrate Power
by James Hoffman and Victoria Ashley
(excerpt)
Proposition 7 mandates the centralized model of energy generation at the expense of the decentralized / distributed model. The advantages of the decentralized renewable energy economy for California are obvious: power generation assets will be owned by millions of individuals and businesses instead of a few giant conglomerates. The infrastructure will be essentially immune from the disruption and manipulation that Californians are all too familiar with. And that infrastructure will use existing rooftop space instead of gobbling up hundreds of square miles of pristine desert lands.
Why, then, would the centralized fossil-fuel model be applied to ubiquitous clean renewable energy resources? In a word, profits.
(con't)
californiaphoton.com/policy/propositions/prop7/editorial....
