We do things differently, here
Another slightly edited letter published in The Age today. Maybe I should become a media mogul. Original here:
I've just come back from a tour of Europe. Wind farms are everywhere. Near tourist attractions, and along roads where it is particularly windy. Anywhere appropriate, and especially near townships and individual houses, because that's where the consumers of electricity are. No one seems to have a problem with them. People there don't suffer from increased rates of cancer or bogus self-imagined inflictions. They don't ban building windmills within 2km of towns. They don't ban the building along a windy stretch of road because tourists happen to drive along there.
They also don't develop in green wedges, allow cattle to graze in their national parks, or try to make it easier to log old growth forest and make it harder to protect such lands.
Europeans seem to have no problem accepting that, despite their per-capita emissions being way below ours, that something has to change. It's a pity we are not lead by leaders. The best I can manage out of my local member, Ted Baillieu, is a form letter in reply to my concerns, uttering vague niceties about planning and the economy, and attacking the opposition.
I've just come back from a tour of Europe. Wind farms are everywhere. Near tourist attractions, and along roads where it is particularly windy. Anywhere appropriate, and especially near townships and individual houses, because that's where the consumers of electricity are. No one seems to have a problem with them. People there don't suffer from increased rates of cancer or bogus self-imagined inflictions. They don't ban building windmills within 2km of towns. They don't ban the building along a windy stretch of road because tourists happen to drive along there.
They also don't develop in green wedges, allow cattle to graze in their national parks, or try to make it easier to log old growth forest and make it harder to protect such lands.
Europeans seem to have no problem accepting that, despite their per-capita emissions being way below ours, that something has to change. It's a pity we are not lead by leaders. The best I can manage out of my local member, Ted Baillieu, is a form letter in reply to my concerns, uttering vague niceties about planning and the economy, and attacking the opposition.