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Just in case you hadn't noticed, Helene, the most recent hurricane to gain staggering strength by crossing the ever-warmer waters of the Gulf of Mexico, proved devastating not just to the Big Bend region of Florida, where it first made landfall and submerged much of the Gulf Coast, but to states as far-ranging as South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, and Tennessee. Meanwhile, in the American Southwest -- and remember it's now fall, not summer -- 100-degree days are still -- yes, still! -- piling up in a record fashion. (Phoenix hit a record-breaking late September 117 degrees!)
Consider that a reminder that we're ending 2024 on a planet that's distinctly in trouble, whether you're thinking about storms or heat, flooding or fires -- and the human response to all this? Well, it's evidently to go to war. Seemingly unstoppable, distinctly devastating conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, and Sudan are now killing horrific numbers of people, destroying in a stunning fashion, and pouring yet more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
Meanwhile, whether you're talking about coal in China or oil and natural gas in the United States, the production of fossil fuels is still on -- yes! -- the rise (and the possible victor in the coming American presidential election is utterly determined to "drill, baby, drill"). Consider all of that little short of shocking in a world where action to deal with this planet's ever more disturbed climate is, as TomDispatch regular John Feffer (whose weekly column at Foreign Policy in Focus is a must-read affair) makes all too clear today, generally considered someone else's business and responsibility. Let him explain why it's so seldom an issue to face right in our own backyards. Tom
Ask (Not) What You Can Do for Your Planet
Getting from NIMBY to YIMBY
By John Feffer
No one wants a nuclear reactor in their backyard. It's an eyesore and a health hazard, not to mention the hit to your property values. And don't forget the existential danger. One small miscalculation and boom, there goes the neighborhood!
In the 1970s, in the southwest corner of Germany, the tiny community of Wyhl was bracing for the construction of just such a nuclear reactor in its backyard. Something even worse loomed on the horizon: a vast industrial zone with new chemical plants and eight nuclear energy complexes that would transform the entire region around that town and stretch into nearby France and Switzerland. The governments of the three countries and the energy industry were all behind the project.
Even the residents of Wyhl seemed to agree. By a slim 55%, they supported a referendum to sell the land needed for the power plant. In the winter of 1975, bulldozers began to clear the site.
Suddenly, something unexpected happened. Civic groups and environmentalists decided to make their stand in little Wyhl and managed to block the construction of that nuclear reactor. Then, as the organizing accelerated, the entire tri-country initiative unraveled.
It was a stunning success for a global antinuclear movement that was just then gaining strength. The next year, in the United States, the Clamshell Alliance launched a campaign to stop the construction of the proposed Seabrook nuclear power plant in New Hampshire, which they managed to delay for some time.
A few years later, critics of the antinuclear protests would dismiss such movements with the acronym NIMBY for Not In My Backyard. NIMBY movements would, however, ultimately target a range of dirty and dangerous projects from waste incinerators to uranium mines.
A NIMBY approach, in fact, is often the last option for communities facing the full force of powerful energy lobbies, the slingshot that little Davids deploy against a humongous Goliath.
That very same slingshot is now being used to try to stop an energy megaproject in eastern Washington state. A local civic group, Tri-City CARES, has squared off against a similar combination of government and industry to oppose a project they say will harm wildlife, adversely affect tourism, impinge on Native American cultural property, and put public safety at risk.
But that megaproject is not a nuclear power plant or a toxic waste dump. The Horse Heaven Hills project near Kennewick is, in fact, a future wind farm projected to power up to 300,000 homes and reduce the state's dependency on both fossil fuels and nuclear energy.
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