4. Green Technology
Green technology is the use of renewable and reusable resources that do not, or have very little, negative impact on our environment. As a former Republican, I was taught that we were stewards of the planet, and as such, have a responsibility to its care. We already know that burning coal causes horrible diseases, such as black lung, from the early days of the Industrial Revolution. And despite the Coal industry telling us that they can produce "clean coal", there is no such animal. The 90% of toxins they scrub is great, but that 10% is still extremely toxic and deadly to life surrounding such a factory.
And nuclear would be great, except the only way to deal with the waste products is to hire someone to truck the radioactive waste to a special facility. And if the drums leak, such as with an accident in France a couple of years back, where do we turn for help? No one knows how to un-radiate nuclear waste after having had nuclear power plants for decades.
But there are things that we do have that don't produce harmful waste or by-products -- solar and wind. Now, wind is really only useful during the summer months. The hotter it gets in the desert, the windier. But solar? That sun shines here a good 94% of the time, and especially during the summer months, we sure know it. Our Corporate Commission should be ready to move and get solar in place. And our Legislature can and should be working with the Corporate Commission to help them with ideas to get things moving.
Green technology is vital to the expansion of Arizona and we should and can be the industry leader in solar panel production. There are countries like India who are just waiting for us to start selling them solar panels. Do we really want some other state that doesn't have what we have jumping ahead of us? It's time to take the reigns and make a difference.
