Reply #6: My county didn't just hold a meeting on a nuclear plant

[malakai2]

They did hold a meeting on wind power, and some local landowners did advance that industry position, effectively enough that setback, bond, and noise rules did not change. I don't know that they'd be looking at a nuclear plant from the "enough electricity to run Y houses" perspective anyway, I get the feeling they'd wonder first why we'd bother with nuclear here. They're perfectly happy to run a large coal plant (and four more in the area) so they can sell the excess electricity to Minnesota, so that Minnesota can use those electrons while still meeting their carefully-worded RPS by not burning that coal within Minnesota. From the locals' perspective, it's not about lowering emissions or minimizing environmental impacts at all, it's about making easy money.

In the case of the pro-development landowners referenced above, they can lease a couple acre or half acre sites well away from their homes (but near their neighbors' homes...TS, I guess), get a big check up front, and then continue to pull in essentially the same farm subsidy money for the duration of the surface lease. So they lobby for it, not using the "hey, vote for this because I'm gonna be rich" ploy that works so well in public discourse, but using the "enough electricity to run Y houses" position. If that's not persuasive enough, they say things like "will grow the local economy," "will provide new jobs," and "they're going to be built anyway, we might as well get the benefit ($) here."