Landscape, Nature And Travel Photography

“To my knowledge, never in American history has either state or federal
wilderness been de-designated in order to allow development"

That is a truly frightening qoute.

To ask whether the Sunrise Power Link should be put in San Diego County:

A. This way
B. That way
C. Some other way

is not the right question. The answer is choice "D", "none of the above".

In the 20th Century the Power Grid served us well.
There was no affordable practical alternative but to install "The Giant Walkers" to bring enough hydroelectric power and fossil fuel power to a growing Southern California.

Regarding the Sunrise Power Link, the SDGE web site says they need to build a "superhighway" of power lines to handle the growing demand for power and peak demand for power in a part of the country residents call blessed, and SDGE calls a cul-de-sac.

In the 1860's what if an 8 lane dirt roadway had been built to handle the influx of pioneers who were going from Omaha to San Francisco.
Fortunately, instead, something was done that had never been done before, the knowledge and technology to do it did not exist, but it was done.
A railroad was built.
And it was started in the middle of the civil war, and built almost entirely by hand.
All but a few said it couldn't be done.
Fortunately over 100 years ago we had people like Pres. Abraham Lincoln who was a positive thinker planning for the future in the midst of catastrophe.

A more recent comparison: In the 1960's what if we had just added more phone lines to handle additional fax communications and voice communications instead of developing the internet. How many more phone circuits would we need today if the web of the internet did not exist?

The Power Grid system, like a cul-de-sac, is a dead end technology.
It is already obsolete and expanding it would be like building an 8 lane superhighway dirt road instead of an internet.
The towers are vulnerable to vandalism and worse.
The power plants, towers, lines, substations all require costly maintenance and repair.
Fortunately, there are alternatives.

It is past time for us, as a society, to make the change from a Power Grid system to a Power Web system.
This concept puts our existing resources to multi-tasking use.
The space above homes, businesses, government offices, parking lots, even highways, is used to host solar cells.
The power from those solar cells goes through a meter.
The property owner where the solar cells are installed, sells the electricity to the local power distribution company at wholesale rate.
The power goes into the existing local grid for distribution throughout the grid.

The cost to property owners: $0 if SDGE would use 1.3 billion dollars to pay for the equipment and installation to create such a system.
By not having to buy up land to install solar cells, but using space above existing property is a savings.
Not having to install towers and lines or maintain them is a savings.
Basically, SDGE would put the very customers they serve into the business of selling renewable electricity at wholesale rate to SDGE, thus creating a symbiotic and ecologically sound relationship.

The companies that produce electric power from oil, natural gas, and coal, should correctly think that this is a threat to them.
It would not be a threat if they would diversify and start manufacturing solar cells. There is a lot of money to be made.

We will still need a Power Grid to move hydropower and fossilpower around at night, and on cloudy days, but we can mitigate the need to continue to expand that grid and the polluting fossil fuel power plants that feed it, starting today.

Today is the day that we literally "draw a line in the sand" and just say NO to the expansion of a Power Grid system that is beyond obsolete.

Today is the day we decide that we will to create a system that provides POWER TO THE PEOPLE, FROM THE PEOPLE.

In so doing, the original objective, of protecting our environment will be achieved.

Glenn Stokes
glenn@stokesphoto.com
San Diego, CA

More info added at the following link:
http://www.jmg-galleries.com/blog/2007/01/24/an...

Having lived in the San Diego area for 10 years, I visited Anza-Borrego many times. It remains a highlight of living in Southern California. And now a major powerline to fragment this area? Certainly a different plan can be chosen to still meet the overconsumptive needs of Southern California.

Karen Wellner