To the Editor,

I struggle with Basav Sen’s rationale that renewable energy, he must mean wind and solar, can replace fossil fuel employment. Whereas Paul Steidler thereafter identifies a huge problem with increased costs to everyone if accomplished as planned. Basav Sen like many environmentalists says pollution, meaning CO2 but calling it only carbon, is the cause for climate change. That is misdirected. The US has reduced CO2 by 50% switching to natural gas and nuclear whereas China, India and the underdeveloped world have added 10 times that in coal fired fuel plants.

I am astonished by cries of climate change doomsday being reported. Our climate has been warming for 12,000 yrs, since the last Ice Age. Climate is cyclical. But I do not see CO2 at the heart of this threat. It is a component of the air we breathe and is not a pollutant. Plants, oceans and vegetation recycle it. Our atmosphere is 0.04% CO2 and I fail to see a human caused increase as a calamity. Yet the calls for elimination are startling. And the proposals to do so are folly.

One group is suggesting we shoot micro particulate matter into the upper atmosphere to block sun rays and cool the earth. Whereas they might stay in an orbit for a while, what goes up must come down. Electric autos are a laugh. Just 250 miles and overnite charge means at best a niche market. Tesla Motors was lured into EA by the $7,500 tax rebate offered by our govt. That is expiring along with govt subsidies on wind and solar generation to save us from CO2 danger, which is a fabrication.

Nuclear is where the answer lies for clean jobs, business and clean energy. And nuclear can power our world perfectly if fossil fuels are eliminated. But environmentalists lack technological understanding—-or are otherwise ignorant of the science. Green Industries all depend upon storage batteries when the wind doesn’t blow and sun doesn’t shine. Storage batteries are at maximum technology and incapable of supplying electricity to eliminate fossil fuel power plants or automobiles.

Yet country wide renewable electricity is dependent upon storage batteries to hold the electricity that cannot be used near term. However, Bill Gates invested $1 billion in renewables and notes that “there is no technology close to allowing us to take all our energy from renewables”. Gates can afford a billion dollars as a show of support for a prospective industry but most of us need an investment to show more of a return than that.

Ron Jones