DID YOU KNOW? Bonnie Donovan
Did you know that Gov. Gavin Newsom controls the amount of electricity produced in California?
He has just signed an executive order to increase electricity supply as the state braces for the continuation of a major heatwave. Does this mean he has been restricting the production of electricity? If so, who gave him that power?
Is this caused by the stresses placed on the grid by going green far too quickly? Gov. Newsom has told electric car owners to stop charging cars during the heatwave. Already, the grid can’t handle it!
Here’s the latest news from Europe. Electricity supply problems and soaring energy costs pre-dated the Ukrainian war. Experts are warning that Europe has been going green far too fast.
In Germany, the premature closing of nuclear power plants caused massive energy shortages and huge increases in costs. Wind turbines and solar panels are delivering far less megawatt power than their advertised capabilities. An energy expert stated this is a warning for America. Europeans went green too far, too fast.
European Union President Ursula von der Leyen said Europe’s electric grid is not suited for going fully green.
Last Monday, energy prices in Europe hit a record of $993 per megawatt hour. Last June the average price for electricity in the U.S. was $129 per MWh.
The bigwigs in California like to boast that California’s economy is the fifth largest in gross domestic product among the countries of the world. In 2021, California’s GDP equivalent was $3.4 trillion. That was greater than the United Kingdom and India but behind Germany. Therefore, we cannot think of California in the same terms as most other states in the U.S. We must hold our elected leaders more accountable, than ever before, for the fate of our state.
In 18th-century England, men wore large, powdered wigs as a symbol of power and authority. They became known as “bigwigs.” America followed, and four of America’s presidents wore powdered wigs in office. President James Monroe was the last one. We still use the term “bigwig” to refer to some people in authority, especially among those in government.
“Bigwig” Newsom is now facing, as are we all, his failures to act to prevent a collision of two cyclones rushing toward us that will create a perfect storm of concurrent, starvation in both water and energy. These events will be accompanied by both inflation and a recession created by the federal government in its reckless printing of trillions of dollars. The reason prices are rising is that the value of the dollar is falling.
Last week we dealt with Gov. Newsom’s neglect of a threatening water starvation.The governor’s answer, a few weeks ago, was “We need more desalination plants.” Wow! Members of his political party have been opposing them for years. Only a few months ago the Coastal Commission refused a permit to build one in Orange County. But what about all the other measures that are necessary to prevent a water catastrophe?
Then Gov. Newsom suddenly realized that his approval of a massive move over to all-electric vehicles, and all-electric appliances by a date certain, could not be supported by an electric grid powered only by wind and solar.
More importantly, the grid itself is incapable of supporting the great increases in demand for all-electric power, as fossil fuels and nuclear power are shut down. He has not acted on the massive, electric grid redesign and reconstruction necessary to store and distribute these huge increases in electric power demands, which are out of sync with his ambitions.
What did the governor do?
He performed another knee-jerk reaction. Instead of going into a re-examination of his policies that will bring down the electric grid, he performed a strategic retreat. He canceled the order to shut down the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant near Avila Beach in San Luis Obispo County. But that is only a partial palliative to a much greater problem.
California does not produce much of the electric power it uses. Our power-producing plants have been steadily closing down for years. We are dependent on buying electric power from other states.
But those out-of-state power sources will run into the same energy shortages and grid problems, as they transfer from fossil fuels and nuclear to wind and solar and away from oil, gasoline, diesel and natural gas, to electric-only power on just about everything.
Maintaining the operation of the Diablo Canyon plant does nothing to replace our antiquated electric grid.
Did you know the drug overdose death rate in America continues to expand? The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that there was a 15% increase in overdose deaths from 93,655 in 2020 to 107,000 in 2021. The estimates up to this month in 2022 are not yet in, but the huge increases in DEA drug interceptions indicate another large increase in deaths for this year.
The greatest cause of overdose deaths is fentanyl — a laboratory-designed synthetic drug made largely in Mexico from ingredients supplied by China.
Fentanyl-laced, brightly-colored pills, designed to attract and addict young people are the latest innovation to increase sales of this powerful deadly drug. Make no mistake. Fentanyl produced and distributed by these traffickers and dealers is a deadly poison. If it does not kill you the first time around, it will make you addicted and kill you later.
If Chinese and Mexican gunmen, together with American associates, came to America and killed more than 100,000 Americans every year, would you demand government action to kill or capture these murderers, and would you demand that those captured face charges of, at least, manslaughter, more likely murder?
Then why are we not demanding indictments of attempted murder and murder for the traffickers and street dealers who, knowingly, peddle poisonous pills to our neighbors, friends, and relatives, including our children in school?
What are all our state and federal representatives doing locally, nationally, and internationally to stop this annual slaughter?
Think about this. Over all the years of war in Vietnam, 58,220 soldiers were killed. In Iraq from March 2003 and October 2018, 4,550 service members were killed and 3,793 civilian military contractors were killed. In Afghanistan, we lost 2,488 military personnel. Many more were injured. The total of American deaths in these three wars number 70,000 to 85,000. All premature death is a tragedy. Just consider the scale of death in war, compared to the scale of death occurring on our streets every day, every year.
We ask U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal, D-Santa Barbara, this question. What are you doing in the halls of Congress to eradicate the perpetrators of this scourge of endless death among Californians and the country? Or are saving butterflies in Pismo Beach the limit of your ambitions?
Bonnie Donovan writes the “Did You Know?” column in conjunction with a bipartisan group of local citizens. It appears Sundays in the Voices section.
