Pro-Natural-Gas-Plant, Anti-Environmental Op-ed Draws Response

By Michael Beck 

Sawiskas’ OpEd piece slickly promotes the Grayson Expansion as the only possible replacement for Glendale’s obsolete power plant. But his argument suffers from the very first because it demonizes the opposition as “fear-mongering” and “zero-tolerance,” never a good tactic if one wishes to come across as reasonable and balanced.

Why is the opposition upset about the Grayson Expansion? Well, first off, the entire 5000-page proposal plus EIR was written by the very two entities that designed the project. No independent studies of the potential for renewables made it into this proposal or Sawiskas’ defense of it.

 Second, they ignore the true danger of global warming, which Governor Brown calls the greatest existential threat of our times, and which the global scientific community views with utter alarm. If this alarm is “fear-mongering,” then I’ll go with the scientists and not with front people for the fossil fuel industry.

 These are but two of at least a dozen major unaddressed problems with the Grayson Expansion. The opposition’s plea that this plan be put on hold pending an independent assessment is a far cry from “zero-tolerance” radicalism.