Texas is greener than Massachusetts

From the Boston Globe magazine: “Environmentalism? Yee haw! ”

How embarrassing is this? Pro-environment, green-thinking Massachusetts has virtually shut the door to alternative energy developers such as Cape Wind. Meanwhile, oil-loving, redneck Texas is poised to build the nation's largest wind farm. Most of our local political establishment has united in opposition to wind. At the same time, Lone Star politicians are spearheading what they call the "Texas wind rush" in the Gulf of Mexico. Massachusetts was once in the fore-front of developing renewable energies. By the end of this year, Texas will probably be the number one source of wind power in the United States.

For years, the citizens of California refused to build up their own energy infrastructure which in turn forced them to purchase electricity from Texas-owned power farms. The moment demand outstripped supply, the Golden State faced rolling blackouts and Enron-gouged electricity rates. Texas has it figured out: no matter how much people dislike oil, or natural gas, or wind farms, they hate power outages a whole lot more.