Michigan To Cut 420+ Acres Of Trees For Solar Farm
Michigan is poised to cut down hundreds of acres of forest to make space for a solar panel development, MLive reported Thursday
The state will soon start competitive bidding on approximately 420 acres of forested land near Gaylord, Michigan, to clear space for a solar farm while generating revenue and advancing the state’s long-term ‘green’ energy targets, according to MLive.
There is some evidence suggesting that such a move would increase emissions, and Michigan is one of the least sunny states in the country, according to an analysis conducted by The Washington Post.
“Not incredibly popular with everyone,” Scott Whitcomb, the director of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) public lands office, told MLive. “I will be frank about that.”
“We don’t give this land away for free,” Whitcomb told the outlet. “That lease revenue can go into natural resources management. So, I wouldn’t say it’s the only reason, but it is something we think about. The bottom line is, we have to pay for the activities of this agency somehow.”
Notably, one study published by Harvard researchers found that clearing forests to replace solar panel developments may actually lead to an overall increase in emissions, and a paper published by Chinese researchers also reached similar conclusions.
There are also oil and gas wellheads in other areas of the woods that remain forested, according to MLive.
“This is pretty amazing. Michigan is not like California, it’s not like the sun is always shining there,” Dan Kish, a senior research fellow at the Institute for Energy Research, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
“This is the theater of the absurd, and it’s all driven by tax credits and giveaways from the federal and state government, and by mandates that the governor there has implemented.”
Michigan’s Healthy Climate Plan states that officials should “avoid land-use conversion that causes a net increase in emissions and prioritize land uses that reduce emissions” concerning the state’s waters and forests, but Whitcomb told MLive that he hopes to use some solar revenues to purchase land for uses like connecting habitat for wildlife or ‘carbon’ sequestration.
Whitcomb added that the 420 acres is already cut in half by a major transmission line that will make it easier to get the solar farm operational and make it less likely that new power lines will need to be built.
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Tom
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My state still has too many liberal/leftist loonies running the show. I have experienced two or three sunny days here in the last 6 weeks. And pray tell, what good are solar panels when the pilots of death are clouding up the skies with their poisons? A few days ago, it was fairly sunny and 25 degrees and still they were doing chemtrails. Idjits all the way around.
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