Wasted Real Estate

Did you know that 50 million acres (78,000 square miles) of American farmland are dedicated to growing biofuel? As in, the ethanol that the government requires be added to gasoline. Because... the corn lobby, and that's about it. Iowa's first-in-the-nation Presidential caucuses puts a lot of pressure on politicians to continue this bit of payola.

Did you know that providing the US annual consumption of 4050 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity solely with solar panels would require about 14 million acres (21,250 square miles) of land? That's just the panels, and doesn't include mining footprints or additional distribution network acreage. Tack on another 20-50% if all our vehicles go electric. Wind power land usage is on the same order of magnitude.

Did you know that nuclear power, which currently provides about 20% of America's electricity, occupies a total of about 150,000 acres (including uranium mining)?

Imagine restoring those 50 million acres of corn to forest and leaving unmolested those 14 million acres needed for solar or wind.

Why in the world are we devoting so much land to powering our lives, when we could instead add 200 more nuclear plants to the 54 currently in operation? Or, if they continue coercing us into electric cars, a hundred beyond that? At worst, we'd up land usage to a million acres, which is a triviality compared to the biofuel/wind/solar land rapacity. We would also:

• Liberate ourselves from dependence on foreign minerals.

• Liberate the world from dependence on hostile nations for oil or gas (Drill, baby, drill! Sell, baby, sell!! Export, baby, export!!!). There would be a massive favorable shift in geopolitical power even if we didn't export reactors and only exported natural gas.

• Clean our air of coal power particulates, saving up to 15,000 lives a year.

• Eliminate the need for redundancies, overcapacity, and backup power generators (usually natural gas).

• Obviate the unsolved storage problem.

• Save the whales (perhaps) from the harm inflicted by off-shore wind farms.

• Sequester a lot of atmospheric carbon (25+ tons per acre in the "greener" states).

• Prevent the pollution created by mining the rare earths and other metals needed for wind/solar/batteries.

• Reduce the exploitive working conditions found in the countries that produce those metals.

You get the idea.

Why, then, the obsession with wind and solar, rather than nuclear? Why are we going down the extremely difficult and wasteful path, rather than the easier one?

The answer lies in these Kinsley Gaffes uttered by a couple of the world's Best-and-Brightest some time ago.

An easy solution like nuclear would allow people to continue living their lives as they currently do, which is to say "to excess." That those who lament this outcome are often private jet flying and limo riding is, of course, the big joke. The Best-and-Brightest will be the least affected by the hardships their grand plans will create.

The smart set sees global warming remediation as a Trojan horse for establishing command economies around the globe and "liberating" people from the wealth, independence, and self-determination that capitalism provides. They see a path to greater power and control. Rent-seeking sycophants see opportunity for cronyist self-enrichment. Ignorant-arrogant "green" kids see an opportunity to yell and deride the benighted masses who aren't willing to sacrifice their (or others') living standards on the WASABI altar.

In other words, because some see more power in it, some see more Other People's Money in it, some see more ability to control others in it, and some see the opportunity for virtue signal in it.

I've said it more times than I can count: If anthropogenic global warming (AGW) is indeed a problem, the solution is nuclear power. If AGW isn't the problem that we are told, nuclear power is still a great idea, with a bevy of real and consequential benefits.

Some have figured this out, with 170 new plants in planning or under construction world-wide.

Who is leading the way? Not the West, which has committed to the slow suicide of Wind and Solar and Battery Idiocy.

Will we wake up in time to avert that economic suicide? Only if you and I scream "nuclear power" from every rooftop. And, tell every sky-is-falling green out there that if the first words they utter when you ask "remedy?" aren't "nuclear power," they aren't serious or informed thinkers.

Finally, if "Fukushima!" or "Nuclear waste!!" or "Chernobyl!!!" comes to mind when you read this, don't worry, I got you covered.