MarinIJ - to the Editor re Marin Clean Energy
Submitted by open4energy on Fri, 02/05/2010 - 20:09
Important notice to all our readers.
On February 19th open4energy published a formal apology and retraction including the opinion published by the Marin IJ. We have left this page on our web site so that what we said, and then found to be incorrect, can be clear for all our readers!
Politicians calling PG&E a Bully?
On Tuesday the Marin County Board of Supervisors took the expected decision to secure critical start-up capital for the Marin Energy Authority, a newly formed government body with plans to purchase and sell greener electricity to the residents of Marin County.
I was there to witness the public discussion and rationale for risking the Marin residents tax dollars.
Board member Mr Charles McGlashan, also the Chairman of the Marin Energy Authority, framed the risk to the project as being from lethal and bully like tactics of PG&E. Steve Kinsey echoed this sentiment with "We have this remarkable bully that is doing everything in its power to prevent us from being on the playground, to which Andy Peri, the Marin County Bicycle Coalition's, added "Let's not let Goliath crush our efforts," You could feel the righteous indignation grow, helped by a well-timed reminder that this is the company who almost bankrupted California.
How ironic, that PG&E would find themselves on the receiving end of the same misleading practices they were once guilty of.
In accusing PG&E, the members of the Marin Energy Authority have done a fine job of deflecting the discussion from the real issues at hand.
First, not one of the published executives in this new government body has a resume' demonstrating any experience in the role of buying and selling electricity.
Second, the electricity will be supplied by a foreign oil company, Shell Energy North America, a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell. Their motives are obvious; find any way to force PG&E to distribute electricity they produce to the sixth-largest economy in the world, California.
Third, there are excellent technical reasons why this is a really bad idea. California represents 50% of the United States rooftop solar generation. We should be grateful to PG&E for the continued investment they are making in the smart grid so that our distributed power generation can be accommodated. Electricity is an electron, moving at the speed of light. Can we listen to experts and not politicians for guidance on the complex concepts involved. Only yesterday we read that Mill Valley is the target market for Tesla, our Silicon Valley, federally funded, next generation electric car. Thank goodness PG&E is already planning for the demand shift that will be created by the needs to charge these vehicles each night.
Fourth, the smart grid initiatives of PG&E is probably the single largest opportunity for the economic recovery of Marin residents in Silicon Valley. May we put an end to alienating our employer and customer with these baseless allegation.
Fortunately for us this bully is in recovery! PG&E continues to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in the technologies that employ our residents. They are using their money to inform us of these political shenanigans. And they remain ready to partner with us in our ongoing energy requirements.
None of us, particularly PG&E, wants a foreign oil company to be delivering electricity to Marin, and from there to the whole of California.
The experts have spoken, and their opinions are available on the Internet. I encourage the ongoing energy conscientiousness and well motivated green initiatives, but please can we be informed so that we make good decisions without political bias and hidden agendas.
Alexander Bischoff is the publisher of http://open4energy.com - an open source blog on the smart grid, technology for consumer and small-business energy-saving.
On February 19th open4energy published a formal apology and retraction including the opinion published by the Marin IJ. We have left this page on our web site so that what we said, and then found to be incorrect, can be clear for all our readers!
Politicians calling PG&E a Bully?
On Tuesday the Marin County Board of Supervisors took the expected decision to secure critical start-up capital for the Marin Energy Authority, a newly formed government body with plans to purchase and sell greener electricity to the residents of Marin County.
I was there to witness the public discussion and rationale for risking the Marin residents tax dollars.
Board member Mr Charles McGlashan, also the Chairman of the Marin Energy Authority, framed the risk to the project as being from lethal and bully like tactics of PG&E. Steve Kinsey echoed this sentiment with "We have this remarkable bully that is doing everything in its power to prevent us from being on the playground, to which Andy Peri, the Marin County Bicycle Coalition's, added "Let's not let Goliath crush our efforts," You could feel the righteous indignation grow, helped by a well-timed reminder that this is the company who almost bankrupted California.
How ironic, that PG&E would find themselves on the receiving end of the same misleading practices they were once guilty of.
In accusing PG&E, the members of the Marin Energy Authority have done a fine job of deflecting the discussion from the real issues at hand.
First, not one of the published executives in this new government body has a resume' demonstrating any experience in the role of buying and selling electricity.
Second, the electricity will be supplied by a foreign oil company, Shell Energy North America, a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell. Their motives are obvious; find any way to force PG&E to distribute electricity they produce to the sixth-largest economy in the world, California.
Third, there are excellent technical reasons why this is a really bad idea. California represents 50% of the United States rooftop solar generation. We should be grateful to PG&E for the continued investment they are making in the smart grid so that our distributed power generation can be accommodated. Electricity is an electron, moving at the speed of light. Can we listen to experts and not politicians for guidance on the complex concepts involved. Only yesterday we read that Mill Valley is the target market for Tesla, our Silicon Valley, federally funded, next generation electric car. Thank goodness PG&E is already planning for the demand shift that will be created by the needs to charge these vehicles each night.
Fourth, the smart grid initiatives of PG&E is probably the single largest opportunity for the economic recovery of Marin residents in Silicon Valley. May we put an end to alienating our employer and customer with these baseless allegation.
Fortunately for us this bully is in recovery! PG&E continues to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in the technologies that employ our residents. They are using their money to inform us of these political shenanigans. And they remain ready to partner with us in our ongoing energy requirements.
None of us, particularly PG&E, wants a foreign oil company to be delivering electricity to Marin, and from there to the whole of California.
The experts have spoken, and their opinions are available on the Internet. I encourage the ongoing energy conscientiousness and well motivated green initiatives, but please can we be informed so that we make good decisions without political bias and hidden agendas.
Alexander Bischoff is the publisher of http://open4energy.com - an open source blog on the smart grid, technology for consumer and small-business energy-saving.
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