Electric cars still require energy, you know

To the editor:

Here is my question: What will be the source of energy for the new electric cars?

Here is some arithmetic. The new electric cars will require a battery charge of about 8 kilowatt-hours for each 30 miles of travel (Wednesday Review-Journal). The president has said that he wants 1 million electric vehicles on the road by 2015 (Sunday Review-Journal).

If we consider commuting only and estimate 7,500 miles per year per car, we will need about 1.5 billion kilowatt-hours of additional electric capacity beyond the amount that we currently use to cool our houses and light our streets.

Given the efficiencies needed, wind and solar power are unlikely to be able to provide additional capacity of this magnitude. New nuclear power plants could provide the additional capacity but, given the high cost of construction, licensing and on-site spent fuel storage, this option does not appear likely.

It appears to me that the only practical source would be natural gas or coal-fired plants, with their associated waste and carbon emissions. Planned additions to current capacity from these sources are hardly sufficient to provide the needed energy.

Has anyone considered the magnitude of the ramp-up in additional capacity needed to support an electric vehicle transportation system?

Larry Rickertsen

HENDERSON

Free speech

To the editor:

In his letter of Aug. 13, Philip Cohen writes about protest and the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech. I do agree with him that protest and freedom of speech do go hand and hand. However, his suggestion that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called protesting un-American is incorrect.

Freedom of speech is a doubled-edged sword. Every American is so guaranteed. Some of those in opposition to the health care reform bill are showing up at town hall meetings and abusing the right to free speech.

I'm quite sure that even John Adams would have said that the abuse of free speech -- exercising your right to the point of not allowing discourse -- is not what James Madison had in mind when he penned what became the First Amendment. These are the protesters that Speaker Pelosi called un-American.

Town hall meetings are for the purpose of dispensing and gathering information. Those in opposition of health care reform are certainly within their rights to participate and voice their opposition. But when they disrupt the meetings by abusing their free speech rights, they then become un-American.

Terry E. Peele

LAS VEGAS

Pipe dream

To the editor:

At last, Pat Mulroy and her pipeline are closing in on her Southern Nevada Water Authority Board of Directors. At a cost -- which no one has accurately pegged -- of $3 billion plus, the "project" sets up "necessity thinking" among us peasants.

Ms. Mulroy claims the pipeline will provide water for 270,000 homes. The question becomes, are these existing or new homes? If the 270,000 figure is for new homes ... well, we don't need a multibillion-dollar pipeline or 270,000 more homes. The current traffic, with its drawbacks, should be self-explanatory. Pollution from the resulting increase in cars and trucks should be another nail in the coffin. The social costs of 270,000 more homes should put the issue to rest.

If Nevada could negotiate/squeeze just 1 percent more of the Colorado River instead of our lousy 3 percent, we could live happily ever after -- without the pipeline.

Charles Carpenter

HENDERSON

Prison guards

To the editor:

With the possibility of correctional officer furloughs looming in Nevada's prisons, there are other options that the Board of Examiners should consider to cut expenses. The perfect solution would be that the Interim Finance Committee fund an exemption for the biennium.

However, the Casa Grande Transition Center in Las Vegas has an operating cost, according to the state's budget Web site, of $4,994,382 for the biennium. The center has a capacity of 398 inmates, which are considered trustees. The current inmate occupancy is 243. This leads me to believe that it is a difficult process classifying inmates into the facility. There have also been numerous "walk aways."

There is also the Northern Nevada Restitution Center in Reno with an operating cost of $1.5 million, which currently houses only 53 inmates. The savings from closing these two facilities could meet the budget targets without endangering staff and inmates.

The Department of Corrections, thus far, has not placed these items on the table. Instead, a pending "plan" is being created that would involve the closing of towers, locking down units and other dangerous measures. The 243 inmates at Casa Grande are trustees and could easily be relocated into camps. They currently occupy jobs in the community that could go to local people rather than inmates.

Closing the Transition Center and the Restitution Center would be sensible alternatives to cutting into operating costs of prisons to meet the budget numbers. These measures would not put any jobs at risk as the staff at both centers could easily be absorbed in other locations.

The potential furlough of correctional officers will force the Department of Corrections into a "plan" that would result in dangerous measures of reduction and place staff and inmates in harm's way.

If an exemption is not granted by the Interim Finance Committee for the next two years, then risky reductions could be avoided by thinking outside the box with the closure of "trustee" facilities instead of the operations of prisons.

Gene Columbus

CARSON CITY

THE WRITER IS PRESIDENT OF THE NEVADA CORRECTIONS ASSOCIATION.

Green questions

To the editor:

Let me make sure I understand the solar power imperative. Solar plants require a lot of land. The government wants to promote the construction of solar generating plants in Nevada, locating them in our pristine desert playground and endangered species habitat.

The owners of the solar plants get to tap our drought-restricted water supply for the steam cycle, dust control and to wash down the collector surfaces.

The major components of the plants are manufactured in places such as Arizona, California and Austria. The plants are on automatic dispatch and create very few permanent jobs, and at times are staffed by a single person.

A solar plant does not work except when the sun is shining and requires back-up generation capability of some kind. The plants are not economically competitive and require taxpayer subsidies. Much of the electrical output is slated for California. The corporate profits go to places such as Spain and California.

The planet will not be perceptively cooled by U.S. solar plants unless Secretary of State Hillary Clinton can get India and China to curtail their development.

Tell me one more time how this "green" thing is supposed to work, and what's the problem with nuclear?

Roland Parsons

HENDERSON