Here’s an action summary from Monday’s Kalamazoo City Commission meeting.
Renewable energy
Action includes a work session regarding the City of Kalamazoo’s participation in Consumer Energy’s Renewable Energy Program.
Despite supply-chain problems amid the lingering effects of the pandemic, 2022 saw major increases in solar and wind power in the United States, though that growth varied by state, according to a report released last month by a nonprofit focused on climate change.
American Electric Power said last year that it plans to spend $23.3 billion between 2022 and 2026 on transmission and distribution. But there’s been growing concern at the state and federal level that too much of it is occurring without enough transparency and oversight to ensure transmission owners are appropriately planning for new technology, considering more cost-effective regional approaches or alternate solutions and not ripping off their ratepayers.
WSV’s Dan Robinson recently spoke with Rev. Deb Hansen to discuss how Michigan Interfaith Power & Light puts “faith into action” by promoting “energy efficiency, renewable energy, and other sustainable practices that lead to a cleaner, healthier, and more just world.”
George Ochenski writes, “For years now we’ve been subjected to an endless stream of nonsense from those who deny the inescapable reality that our planet is overheating due to human-caused pollution in the atmosphere. It’s now apparent that the cascading effects of global baking — and the concurrent lack of action by our politicians and lawmakers — are creating enormous societal, economic and environmental problems and threatening our very existence.”
A proposed solar farm in Fabius Township is generating more controversy than energy at the moment. The project, which is in the “very preliminary” stages of development, has some township residents concerned about how it would affect property values, how it may look, and whether it will affect lifestyles of those who live nearby.