Why is this not the least bit surprising?
How the Pacific Northwest’s Dream of Green Energy Fell Apart — ProPublica
Liberal Oregon and Washington Vowed to Pioneer Green Energy. Almost Every Other State Is Beating Them.- Lagging Results: Oregon and Washington trailed most states in adding renewable energy during the past decade, despite pledges to eliminate fossil fuels from power generation.
- Unique Barrier: The Bonneville Power Administration, whose approval is needed for most wind and solar work in the Northwest, has barely approved any big applications made since 2015.
- Missing Investment: Lawmakers were told of the need for better transmission, which Bonneville would have to finance, when they passed new mandates for green energy. They forged ahead anyway.
But the reality is not nearly as inspiring as Kotek made it sound. For all their progressive claims, Oregon and Washington trail nearly all other states in adding new sources of renewable energy. Iowa, a Republican-led state with roughly the same population and usable volume of wind as Oregon, has built enough wind farms to generate three times as much wind power.
What’s held the Northwest back is a bottleneck Oregon and Washington leaders paid little attention to when they set out to go 100% green, an investigation by ProPublica and Oregon Public Broadcasting found: The region lacks the wiring to deliver new sources of renewable energy to people’s homes, and little has been done to change that.
Northwest leaders left it to a federal agency known as the Bonneville Power Administration to arrange badly needed upgrades to an electrical grid that’s nearly a century old in places.
Comments
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The refusal for the LNG pipeline along with the heavy restrictions on timber turned Oregon into a consumer state. Good news is most of the young Dems are so poor the can’t move and ruin Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming with their begging for handouts.
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They won't let PSE create the paths needed for new transmission lines. Can't go cutting down any trees, ya know.
