Date: March 7
Time: 10:32 am
Temp: 45 degree
Moon: Waning half moon in Sagittarius, Moon square Sun
Mood: Clean at last
Wednesday afternoon, March 3, the Vermont legislature voted by an overwhelming majority, to shut down the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant when it’s current operating license expires in 2012. That night, around 7pm, my power went out. Co-incidence? My aunt, who lives down in VY territory, and had also lost power said it seemed to her like a perfect reaction. They lost their fight, they’re mad, they pulled the plug. Now, of course, the energy grid doesn’t work like that. There was a huge statewide snowstorm, high winds, heavy wet snow. This is why we lost our power. Right? Well, I actually think it has more to do with Vermont Yankee than even a conspiracy theorist would believe.
For years our energy has been produced in far away places and delivered to us through a vulnerable, fragile and inefficient system of wires criss-crossing the country. For anyone who has ever been up to the pristine wilderness of northern Labrador and come upon the horrifying site of a ginormous hydroelectric dam and a Hades replica of high voltage electric parks, this truth has never been more evident. Most of our energy needs are met in the most inefficient, expensive, Rube Goldberg designed way possible. We’ve given up the ability to fend for ourselves and instead allow companies, that care only about profit, to build and maintain our energy needs, with ugly, inefficient means. And in the case of Vermont Yankee, violently dangerous. The only thing sadder than realizing this truth, is realizing it didn’t have to be.
Many towns and cities had their own small hydro-electric dams that produced relatively clean energy for its citizens. I know all you uber-environmentalists will cry foul, and tell me all the stats on fish demise, stream bed destruction, and worse. But these small hydro projects were relatively benign when compared to the Three Gorges Dam in China, or Manic Cinq in Labrador, or the Hoover Dam.
But what if we parceled it out even more individually than that? My neighbor has a small array of solar panels, and a thin tall windmill. They no longer suffer the whims of the weather when the rest of the neighborhood is packing their milk in snow in the back shed.
Imagine if Obama gave that billion dollar subsidy to us, We The People, instead of to the nuclear power companies. We could install solar panels, small windmills on each home. Increasing efficiency, decreasing waste. Imagine what it would look like if all the power lines came down, if we took care of our own power needs in a simple self-sufficient way.
I can imagine a world where we took care of things in a natural way, cared more for the earth, and less for the instant payback. Where ‘efficiency of scale’ was replaced by economics of environment.
I lost power for five days. I love living in Vermont, but it’s time I reverted back to the Little House on the Prairie ethic and stopped requiring someone else to give me power. The only way to get real power, is to find it yourself!
