Not Much of a Cheese Shop, Is It?

Hey, we were getting ready to knock a big dent in that energy problem by building a big, honkin' solar energy complex out in the desert. That's the kind of thing that'll make everybody happy, right? Reduce dependence on foreign sources of energy, shrink carbon emissions, and all that rot? Well, no.

The US government is putting a hold on new solar energy projects on public land for two years so it can study the environmental impact of sun-driven plants.

The Bureau of Land Management says the moratorium on solar proposals is needed to determine how a new generation of large-scale projects could affect plants and wildlife on the land it manages.

...

The Bureau of Land Management, which looks after 258 million acres of federal land, much of it flat, sun-baked terrain in the western US considered ideal for solar energy development, says the study is required by law and backed by environmental groups.

It's almost as if certain groups don't want us to have any energy at all. No matter what solutions are proposed--clean coal, windmills, solar--they come up with some reason to shoot it down because of environmental concerns. In the words of Instapundit:

Okay: Nukes are out, coal is filthy, wind power destroys Ted Kennedy's view, and solar leads to "environment fears." Do they just want us all to freeze in the dark? Pretty much, I'd say . . . .

It reminds me of nothing so much as Monty Python's cheese shop sketch, and man, I think they just don't want us to have any cheese.



Update: "Under increasing public pressure over its decision to temporarily halt all new solar development on public land, the Bureau of Land Management said Wednesday that it was lifting the freeze, barely a month after it was put into effect." Well, thank you very little. In the words of Instapundit: "Now how about dropping the barriers to developing other sources of energy, too, while we're at it?"