TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE

My thanks to Shannon Grove and Taft Mayor Dave Noerr for their factually correct Community Voices article (“Clean energy transition must be handled well”) on Sunday.

As we experience higher costs for energy, it becomes a regressive cost, thereby increasing the percentage of income needed, which puts pressure on the less affluent families in our community.

We find ourselves in a situation that was not caused and will not be successfully resolved exclusively by the policy of any political party.

Our planet has become a victim of energy obsolescence. More CO2 than can be accommodated for the long-term existence of its inhabitants.

Present demand for more energy to control internal temperatures is just the surface of our environmental iceberg!

Our efforts should not be limited to the “blame game” for political advantage. Our solution is not a zero-sum approach to fossil fuels or sustainable, renewable energy. It requires both, while we transition to more compatible sources of energy to accommodate our planet.

The present pain of our energy cost will become equivalent to food security when our planet’s temperature extremes and weather volatility become increasingly evident.

We need to embrace energy pricing mechanisms to avoid the unjust results from regressive effects on society.

Our state’s policy of restricting fossil fuel production, (Kern County produces more than 50% of California’s) is misguided. Whether you produce from our prolific and bountiful reserves will not have a major effect on air pollution or CO2 production. Those environmental challenges come from the internal combustion engines that have been the choice of energy from the beginning of the industrial revolution.

All consumers now pay a small charge to reimburse utilities for their “stranded nuclear assets” that were retired due to safety obsolescence. As more sustainable forms of energy become available, our representatives should consider a similar solution for our fossil fuel industry to encourage its abandonment of recoverable reserves in support of our planet’s health. We can refer to it as “stranded assets due to environmental obsolescence!” (The devil, of course, is in the details.)

Time is not our friend. We will look back in 10 years and realize that the cost of providing life support to Mother Earth has increased by a percentage of magnitude! I welcome your suggestions; phil@upstartvillage.com.

If not now — when? — Phil Rudnick, Bakersfield