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Anti-life Environmentalist Turn On Their Own

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Captain Nate

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http://www.wired.com/news/planet/0,2782,69...html?tw=rss.TOP

Thousands of aging turbines stud the brown rolling hills of the Altamont Pass on I-580 east of San Francisco Bay, a testament to one of the nation's oldest and best-known experiments in green energy.

Next month, hundreds of those blades will spin to a stop, in what appears to be a wind-energy first: Facing legal threats from environmentalists, the operators of the Altamont wind farm have agreed to shut down half of their windmills for two months starting Nov. 1; in January, they will be restarted and the other half will be shut down for two months.

Though the Altamont Pass is known for its strong winds, it also lies on an important bird-migration route, and its grass-covered hills provide food for several types of raptors. "It's the worst possible place to put a wind farm," said Jeff Miller, a wildlife advocate at the nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity. "It's responsible for an astronomical level of bird kills."

If this isn't evidence that the environmentalist movement is purely anti-life, I don't know what is.

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http://www.wired.com/news/planet/0,2782,69...html?tw=rss.TOP

If this isn't evidence that the environmentalist movement is purely anti-life, I don't know what is.

This does seem to be a pretty good indicator. Here are some of the statisics they claim :

"A 2004 report by the California Energy Commission found that 880 to 1,300 raptors are killed at Altamont every year, such as red-tailed hawks and the federally protected golden eagle."

Of course, apparently the fictional "rights" of these birds are more important than the possibility of a massive gain in energy efficiency, which would be of clear, enormous benefit to man. Sigh... :confused:

But, take another case from Australia: The sheep farmers there have long said that tail docking is a neccessary part of the sheep farming industry. Otherwise given the often really temperatures, the sheep would get fly-strike and die horrible deaths and be of no use to the farmers anyway.

Of course, PETA have stepped in and are now trying to literally shut down the sheep farming industry in Australia because the farmers refuse to stop the practise (and why should they? There is no good reason to stop it and so many reasons to keep on doing it). They have claimed that it is barbaric to subject sheep to that sort of torture, and that man has no right to tail dock.

Of course, this ignores the fact that the sheep are way better off for it. Tail docking is a rather painful experience for the sheep for a short while, after which they recover and forget about it, this is compared to a slow agonising death from fly-strike.... hmm, there it would seem that a large part of the basis for the PETAs complaint is blatant mistruth, big surprise.

That and the sheep industry is worth millions in Australia, in fact it is a significant part of their GDP. Not only would thousands of farmers go out of bussiness if PETA had their way, but Australia would be economically dealt a significant blow.

Yet again, anti-man, expecting us to sacrifice human rights for the lie of "animal rights". I cannot perceive of a much greater evil than this.

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Of course, apparently the fictional "rights" of these birds are more important than the possibility of a massive gain in energy efficiency, which would be of clear, enormous benefit to man. Sigh... :dough:

I've said many times that if General Electric came up with a way to produce electricity by magic, within a week they would get protested by some 'viro group on the grounds that nobody had proved that magic doesn't cause cancer.

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Trying to shut down wind farms is exactly what I'd expect of the environmentalists. Nobody should be surprised by this, but thanks for presenting more evidence of their anti-man philosophy.

"Renewable energy" is the big lie of environmentalism today. (Over the past few years, The Intellectual Activist has had some good articles about this.) The environmentalists claim they're for "renewable energy", but as soon as some form of it looks like it might become viable, they turn against it.

I've expected this for a long time on the wind farms, because after all, those do kill birds. Another form of renewable energy that the ecofreaks have ended up attacking is "biomass", which is mostly the burning of wood waste. And they turned against hydroelectric power (the one large-scale form of renewable energy that's been viable for years) a long time ago.

If solar power ever became viable on a large scale (doubtful because the sun's radiant energy is so diffuse), they'd turn against it too, becuase after all, look at the huge land area that it takes up.

There isn't any means of power generation that doesn't affect the environment.

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Trying to shut down wind farms is exactly what I'd expect of the environmentalists. Nobody should be surprised by this, but thanks for presenting more evidence of their anti-man philosophy.

"Renewable energy" is the big lie of environmentalism today. (Over the past few years, The Intellectual Activist has had some good articles about this.) The environmentalists claim they're for "renewable energy", but as soon as some form of it looks like it might become viable, they turn against it.

I've expected this for a long time on the wind farms, because after all, those do kill birds. Another form of renewable energy that the ecofreaks have ended up attacking is "biomass", which is mostly the burning of wood waste. And they turned against hydroelectric power (the one large-scale form of renewable energy that's been viable for years) a long time ago.

If solar power ever became viable on a large scale (doubtful because the sun's radiant energy is so diffuse), they'd turn against it too, becuase after all, look at the huge land area that it takes up.

There isn't any means of power generation that doesn't affect the environment.

Well, here is another good example of environmentalism: The Green Party here does not want us to build more hydro-electric stations, because they dont want "The beauty of the rivers to be destroyed".... despite the threat of serious power problems in this country in the nearish future! Of course though, they dont really care about man or his power needs, as long as nature and animals "do well".

It is hardly a surprise that the enviromentalists would be caught in another lie by being in actuality against renewable energy. Anything they perceive (whether realistic or not) that they think can have negative impact on the environment is wrong according to them, and alot of the time it is totally imaginary. or evidently untrue to anyone willing to actually research FACTS as opposed to whatever they claim...

Here is link to a good article most of you have probably read by now that relates to this:

Essay

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Actually, why do they kill birds? Can't the birds just fly around them?

Most can and do. But some don't, mainly when they hunt for food. They have their eyes fixed on the ground and speed into the turbine. One way to eliminate most of this is to change the height of the generator so that the turbine's position is higher.

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I've said many times that if General Electric came up with a way to produce electricity by magic, within a week they would get protested by some 'viro group on the grounds that nobody had proved that magic doesn't cause cancer.

Yes, you're right. In fact, something like this happened once.

Remember "cold fusion"? For those who don't remember, about 15 years ago, some scientists in Utah thought they had figured out how to cause deuterium-deuterium fusion in electrolytic cells, at temperatures close to room temperature. It turned out that this was a case of bad science: the heat being measured wasn't really due to nuclear fusion at all. (Their measurements had been faulty.)

There probably were some physicists who knew all along that there really wasn't any fusion taking place, but for at least a few weeks, the popular news was all positive, to the effect that here was a new energy source that would mean cheap and plentiful energy. And indeed it would have, if it had been real. So there was hope and excitement.

And right in the middle of this, I read an article by some leading environmentalists, on the front page of a major local paper. These ecofreaks were all upset. Why? They were in a panic that man would have a source of plentiful energy! That's right. They weren't worried about some specific environmental effect of cold fusion (since none were known anyway): what they were worried about was that man would have plentiful energy, and that would be a bad thing. Really. Their thinking was that man couldn't be trusted: he'd just mess up the planet, and so it would be better if there were no source of plentiful energy at all.

Which is just yet one more piece of evidence that the environmentalists will oppose any practical method of large-scale energy production. The only ones they support are impractical ones like solar and wind. And they'll turn against those too, as the lead posting of this thread shows.

....

The good news, though, is that environmentalism is losing strength: people are taking it less seriously as 1) one doomsday scenario after another proves to be bogus and 2) awareness of the evils of environmentalism spreads.

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