California is planning to develop renewable energy on 22 million acres of desert. They asked a panel of independent scientists for feedback on their plan, the Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan. The scientists said it was not scientifically sound.
The panel unanimously concluded that DRECP is unlikely to produce a scientifically defensible plan without making immediate and significant course corrections…. ISP 2012 recommends that the DRECP add scientific expertise from outside institutions to help achieve these improvements.
Scientists were asked for their input on a previous plan and were ignored. No doubt the same will happen again. The juggernaut to develop renewable energy in California will apparently let nothing get in its way. Yet if California was going to use the land for oil or coal development, environmentalists would be screaming in protest.
A comment to a KPCC story says it all
I’m a Univ. of Calif. scientist who has been regularly consulted by the DRECP. While I have provided input and critical data, I’m alarmed by how that information has been either completely ignored or simplified to the point of disfunction in the development of the DRECP. If asked again to contribute I doubt I could justify taking the risk of again wasting my time. The process is anything but science-driven.