You Paid Hundreds of Millions for Solar Power to Wreck the Environment.
The 2,300-acre Aratina Solar Project west of Barstow CA is intended to generate 530 megawatts of electricity. But it has infuriated residents with construction dust and a likely threat to centuries-old trees and endangered desert tortoises that are the official state reptile of California and Nevada, the usual environmental safeguards so prevalent in California notwithstanding.
Avantus, the company behind the project, has received over $1 billion in federal money in the last decade and $124 million in federal money in 2023 alone. It operates its own political-action committee, which naturally donates almost exclusively to Democrats.
After 50 years and hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies, loads of regulatory advantages, and political support, solar power generated under 4 percent of America’s electricity in 2023, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). The majority of America’s recent CO2 emissions reductions come from the “decreased use of coal and the increased use of natural gas for electricity generation,” not the growth of solar power, according to the EIA.
Solar power also creates about 300 times more toxic waste per unit of electricity generated than nuclear-power plants do, because solar panels use extremely hazardous materials like sulfuric acid and toxic phosphine gas in their manufacturing, according to a report by Environmental Progress.
For full Article Read Below...
