If you could generate electricity from political correctness and self-righteousness, the Democratic National Convention would be powering a small city even before it starts. For months now, we've heard stories about how green this convention will be. Everything's going to be recycled. No fried foods are allowed (isn't that discriminating against certain ethnic cultures?). Caterers have to use mostly organic and locally-grown food.
The DNC has contracted with a company to provide "carbon offsets" for the unavoidable fossil fuel consumption associated with the convention. Delegates are being urged (cajoled? nagged?) to buy these carbon credits to offset the environmental sin of their travel. But Face The State has discovered that one of the carbon credit recipients isn't doing much carbon offsetting:
WRAY – The eastern Colorado wind turbine tapped for the Democratic National Convention's carbon-offset program has one problem: It doesn't generate any electricity. Convention organizers are now being questioned for their eagerness to market those credits to delegates.
The DNC has contracted with Vermont-based NativeEnergy to offer delegates "Green challenge" carbon offsets to soften the environmental impact of convention travel. That money is then invested in carbon-free "green" energy sources around the country, including a wind turbine installed this year by the Wray School District RD-2. But a Face The State investigation reveals the district's turbine has never produced marketable energy due to massive equipment malfunctions.
It took a blog to expose this boondoggle. Newspaper reporters these days seem to think their job is to recycle press releases and take what politicians and bureaucrats tell them at face value:
In a feature story in Saturday's Rocky Mountain News, reporter Jerd Smith claimed that 20 percent of Wray's power is generated by what it calls "a windmill that toils day and night producing clean electricity." Smith's report professed that the Wray project is "at the heart" of the DNC's carbon-credit program.
The Rocky report also described the school wind turbine as "a project that generates thousands of dollars for the region's cash-strapped schools," but provided no financial data regarding any energy sales to date.
The Rocky story may be right about the windmill generating cash, but it's not from generating energy. It's from hawking worthless "carbon offsets" to the gullible Gaia-worshipping Democratic delegates, who will tell themselves how caring and conscientious they are as they jet across the country to Denver for what amounts to an extended infomercial.
UPDATE (7/30): See comment #3 for some good counter-arguments by an anonymous citizen of Wray. See comment #4 for my response to those.
