WEBVTT - The Battle for a Solar-Powered Future 0:00:02.400 --> 0:00:05.600 This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the 0:00:05.680 --> 0:00:11.800 Thing from iHeart Radio. After decades of debate, it is 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:15.160 now common knowledge that the world is in the midst 0:00:15.200 --> 0:00:19.200 of an ever increasing energy crisis, and that the long 0:00:19.360 --> 0:00:23.119 era of burning fossil fuels for power is contributing to 0:00:23.280 --> 0:00:28.520 our own demise. And yet the transition to alternative energy 0:00:28.840 --> 0:00:31.560 is proving to be more complex than you might think. 0:00:32.240 --> 0:00:37.680 The Harper's Magazine article Boomtown examines the solar land rush 0:00:37.760 --> 0:00:41.640 currently happening in the American West, specifically in the town 0:00:41.680 --> 0:00:46.839 of Beatty in Nai County, Nevada. The Ni County area 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:50.760 has the capacity to produce enough energy through its prospective 0:00:50.840 --> 0:00:56.840 solar farms to power the entire planet, Yes, the entire planet. 0:00:57.560 --> 0:01:01.440 Close to the entrance of Death Valley National Park, It's 0:01:01.480 --> 0:01:05.759 an area rife with flat land and almost endless sunlight, 0:01:06.400 --> 0:01:10.240 but residents are pushing back on proposals to use its 0:01:10.319 --> 0:01:15.240 land for this purpose. After a series of exploitative boom 0:01:15.319 --> 0:01:19.440 bust cycles like the Gold Rush. Residents are opposing the 0:01:19.560 --> 0:01:25.240 plan on ecological and economic grounds. They argue that covering 0:01:25.360 --> 0:01:30.840 Nevada in solar panels will affect wildlife, recreational spaces, and 0:01:30.880 --> 0:01:36.080 the town's future. The article asks the difficult questions of 0:01:36.120 --> 0:01:40.199 who should sacrifice for our collective future and at what cost. 0:01:41.200 --> 0:01:45.640 My guests today are deep into this inquiry. Dustin mulvaney 0:01:45.840 --> 0:01:50.200 is a solar expert and professor of environmental studies at 0:01:50.240 --> 0:01:54.760 San Jose State University, and he collaborated on the Harper's article. 0:01:55.280 --> 0:02:00.240 But first the author of Boomtown, Hilary Angelo, is an 0:02:00.360 --> 0:02:05.680 urban environmental sociologist and associate professor of sociology at the 0:02:05.800 --> 0:02:10.239 University of California, Santa Cruz. She is also a current 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:13.800 member of the Institute for Advanced Study, where she is 0:02:13.880 --> 0:02:17.919 working with other scholars on the issue of climate crisis politics. 0:02:18.600 --> 0:02:21.720 I wanted to know how her work in urban sociology 0:02:22.160 --> 0:02:26.840 was related to sustainability and the growing issue of water scarcity. 0:02:27.520 --> 0:02:29.359 I do a lot of work on urban sustainability and 0:02:29.400 --> 0:02:32.160 sustainability planning in general, and so a lot of questions 0:02:32.200 --> 0:02:37.320 about how human settlement relates to the external environment. So 0:02:37.400 --> 0:02:39.680 one of my interests in this topic and in these 0:02:39.760 --> 0:02:43.160 questions about energy is are we making the same decisions 0:02:43.160 --> 0:02:46.400 again as we now confront this new environmental crisis? Because 0:02:46.560 --> 0:02:49.040 much like we've done with water. We sort of created 0:02:49.040 --> 0:02:51.960 these very large scale infrastructure systems in the twentieth century 0:02:52.280 --> 0:02:55.760 that made huge quantities of water available to you know, 0:02:55.760 --> 0:02:58.160 people who lived in cities in Los Angeles and elsewhere, 0:02:58.360 --> 0:03:03.040 and we're now confronting the unsustainabilities of those decisions, especially 0:03:03.080 --> 0:03:05.280 as the West gets dryer. And so yeah, I think 0:03:05.280 --> 0:03:08.440 there's a kind of similar dynamic that's happening now. Obviously 0:03:08.480 --> 0:03:10.080 we're not going to run out of sun, but we 0:03:10.160 --> 0:03:12.720 will run out of land, or you know, we can 0:03:12.760 --> 0:03:15.320 be making different choices about how to use these resources. 0:03:15.960 --> 0:03:17.960 You know, when I was out there, it was like, 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:21.679 you know, people desperate, a lot of handwringing, a lot 0:03:21.720 --> 0:03:24.560 of pronouncements, and then it would abate and it would 0:03:24.560 --> 0:03:27.480 go away again for a while. But when I read 0:03:27.560 --> 0:03:31.960 your article, I mean, now we pivot from that to Nevada. 0:03:32.480 --> 0:03:35.520 Baity is the city, NI County is the general area. 0:03:35.960 --> 0:03:38.280 And I don't want to use the word nimby, because 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:42.080 that to me bespeaks rich, privileged people who don't want 0:03:42.320 --> 0:03:47.880 things in their vista that are necessary and they want 0:03:47.920 --> 0:03:50.600 to impose among other people. I don't view those people 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:53.600 as nimby. How do you describe those residents there. 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:56.040 Yeah, I mean, it's nice of you not to use 0:03:56.080 --> 0:03:58.920 the term. When I initially heard that there were people 0:03:58.960 --> 0:04:02.040 in the desert protest solar development, I also sort of 0:04:02.160 --> 0:04:04.960 thought or assumed that they were Nimbi's. You know, that 0:04:05.080 --> 0:04:07.400 is the framework that we're used to thinking about these issues, 0:04:07.440 --> 0:04:09.280 which is a question of sort of you know, private 0:04:09.320 --> 0:04:13.280 property or private interests versus questions of public good. When 0:04:13.360 --> 0:04:15.920 I met these people, I mean, I think what I 0:04:15.960 --> 0:04:17.839 found so interesting about them and what made me write 0:04:17.839 --> 0:04:21.640 the article, is that I felt they were actually trying 0:04:21.640 --> 0:04:24.279 to make this very important critique that has more to 0:04:24.320 --> 0:04:26.679 do with what you were just talking about about, for example, 0:04:26.720 --> 0:04:29.360 the choices we made about water and other natural resources 0:04:29.360 --> 0:04:32.599 in the twentieth century. Basically, they were saying, this is 0:04:32.600 --> 0:04:36.000 a question of how we do social change, and we're 0:04:36.040 --> 0:04:38.760 claiming that climate change is this moment of large scale 0:04:38.760 --> 0:04:42.359 social transformation. But actually from our perspective, from their perspective, 0:04:42.760 --> 0:04:45.960 we're making the same decisions about land use, about infrastructure development, 0:04:46.040 --> 0:04:49.080 and so on. So I thought that kind of critique 0:04:49.080 --> 0:04:51.320 that was being made doesn't fit into how we understand 0:04:51.360 --> 0:04:54.880 Nimbi's Public land in the United States is a commons 0:04:54.960 --> 0:04:57.080 or could be described as a commons, which isn't a 0:04:57.120 --> 0:04:59.440 vocabulary that we use in the US very much, but 0:04:59.440 --> 0:05:01.880 people talk ab got it. There's sort of similar fights 0:05:01.880 --> 0:05:05.480 about renewable energy development in Latin America and Africa, and 0:05:05.520 --> 0:05:08.440 people use the term energy grabbing like so they sort 0:05:08.480 --> 0:05:11.480 of talk about this common land being taken by energy 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:14.920 companies and the implications that has for rural livelihoods, And 0:05:14.960 --> 0:05:16.960 so I think that is actually much more similar to 0:05:17.000 --> 0:05:18.440 what's going on in the American West. 0:05:18.560 --> 0:05:23.159 Now, you know, here in New York, where as everybody knows, 0:05:23.200 --> 0:05:26.159 you know, Robert Moses condemns and through eminent domain takes 0:05:26.480 --> 0:05:29.560 whole neighborhoods in the Bronx so we can build a highway. 0:05:30.400 --> 0:05:33.920 In New York City in cooperation with the state, sees 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:38.080 through eminent domain valleys of land that they evicted everybody 0:05:38.120 --> 0:05:40.320 from and flooded them to make the reservoir system for 0:05:40.360 --> 0:05:44.400 the city's drinking water. But in the area of Nevada 0:05:44.440 --> 0:05:47.480 you were in, do they view it purely as another 0:05:47.839 --> 0:05:53.080 rush companies coming in private companies to alter the landscape. 0:05:53.680 --> 0:05:59.240 Do they see it as a critical element potentially in 0:05:59.320 --> 0:06:02.040 something that we all have to make some sacrifices for 0:06:02.040 --> 0:06:05.359 in some contribution, which is to address climate change. 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:08.520 Right, Yeah, it's a good question. I don't know. I 0:06:08.520 --> 0:06:10.719 think some of them do and some of them probably don't. 0:06:10.800 --> 0:06:10.920 Right. 0:06:10.960 --> 0:06:16.479 For some people, there is a very personal emotional reaction 0:06:16.600 --> 0:06:18.440 that any of us would have, right if the government 0:06:18.520 --> 0:06:22.080 was coming and seizing land or you know, building flooding 0:06:22.120 --> 0:06:23.960 a valley and putting a reservoir in your backyard. Of 0:06:24.000 --> 0:06:25.880 that kind of thing, they just got themselves as fighting 0:06:25.880 --> 0:06:28.279 for their lives. So that I think often in that 0:06:28.320 --> 0:06:30.920 framework it doesn't sort of rise to the level of 0:06:30.960 --> 0:06:33.840 the public good questions. But you know, one thing I 0:06:33.880 --> 0:06:37.400 would say is that even within that, like even when 0:06:37.640 --> 0:06:40.080 we start thinking in those terms about you know, what 0:06:40.240 --> 0:06:42.640 is in the national interest or the public interest here, 0:06:42.800 --> 0:06:46.120 and how should these public lands be used, Like, there's 0:06:46.120 --> 0:06:50.000 a real question about what the highest and best use is. 0:06:50.080 --> 0:06:51.960 So for example, in the West, there was a period 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:54.560 of time when valleys were being flooded for reservoirs. 0:06:54.640 --> 0:06:54.800 Right. 0:06:55.240 --> 0:06:57.760 So, I mean there have been shifts in the kind 0:06:57.800 --> 0:07:01.400 of American public consciousness and sentiment about these issues over 0:07:01.480 --> 0:07:05.000 time in terms of saying to themselves, well, you know, 0:07:05.040 --> 0:07:06.640 the thing that's really in the public interest is to 0:07:06.640 --> 0:07:08.480 have this reservoir here versus the thing that's in the 0:07:08.520 --> 0:07:11.720 public interest is to save this you know, beautiful valley 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:13.640 so that we can have that as part of our 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:17.120 heart fish stocks exactly. And so yeah, I think what 0:07:17.240 --> 0:07:19.760 I find complicated about this question is is that that's 0:07:19.800 --> 0:07:21.600 an open question. Right. There's a climate crisis and we 0:07:21.640 --> 0:07:23.800 have to be carbonized, but there's also an extinction crisis 0:07:23.800 --> 0:07:27.360 and a biodiversity crisis, and so one can argue that 0:07:27.960 --> 0:07:31.560 preserving desert habitat is you know, is also an important 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:32.880 part of responding to claims. 0:07:33.040 --> 0:07:36.680 Just so if you have where you you mentioned in 0:07:36.720 --> 0:07:39.800 the article, the eighty five percent of the land mass 0:07:39.800 --> 0:07:42.360 in the state of Nevada is federal land. Yeah, and 0:07:42.760 --> 0:07:43.800 is all of that controlled by. 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:47.040 BLM basically yes. So yeah, So for. 0:07:47.000 --> 0:07:50.160 People who are listening, is Beaty and n County is 0:07:50.200 --> 0:07:52.800 that on federal land that they're allowed to occupy or 0:07:52.800 --> 0:07:54.360 are they in private land? 0:07:54.680 --> 0:07:57.160 It's federal land. So Beaty is a small is a 0:07:57.200 --> 0:07:59.720 town that they describe as sort of landlocked. So it's 0:07:59.760 --> 0:08:03.480 a little island of you know, people have owned parcels 0:08:03.480 --> 0:08:06.000 of land and then it's surrounded by public land and 0:08:06.120 --> 0:08:08.600 for people who are listening. So public lands managed mostly 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:10.400 by the Bureau of Land Management, which is a department 0:08:10.440 --> 0:08:13.480 of the Interior, sometimes the Forest Service and other things, 0:08:13.600 --> 0:08:16.000 and they're managed under what's called the multiple Use Mandate, 0:08:16.040 --> 0:08:18.680 which means these lands, unlike national parks, are open for 0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:23.320 extractive activities or energy development as well as recreation. And 0:08:23.480 --> 0:08:25.280 it's actually one in ten acres of land in the 0:08:25.360 --> 0:08:29.320 United States, which I found amazing just to learn. So, yeah, 0:08:29.360 --> 0:08:32.360 so it's a little island of a regular town where 0:08:32.400 --> 0:08:35.160 people own properties surrounded by this public land. 0:08:35.720 --> 0:08:39.400 When did the people of NY County get introduced to 0:08:39.480 --> 0:08:40.960 this rush? 0:08:41.040 --> 0:08:44.040 Basically now it's happening now. So there was a sort 0:08:44.080 --> 0:08:46.800 of initial solar rush or you know, phase one of 0:08:46.800 --> 0:08:48.880 the solar rush, which is about ten years ago. And 0:08:49.000 --> 0:08:51.760 Dustin Melvini, who you'll be speaking to later today, has 0:08:51.760 --> 0:08:54.240 been studying that so can talk about this over a 0:08:54.280 --> 0:08:57.360 longer timescale. But much of that took place in California. 0:08:57.440 --> 0:08:59.600 And so the people I mentioned in the article, Kevin 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:02.080 and Laura, who run a nonprofit called Basin and Range Watch. 0:09:02.200 --> 0:09:04.520 They have been part of a group of sort of 0:09:04.600 --> 0:09:09.120 western desert advocates and desert protectors, who include people trained 0:09:09.120 --> 0:09:11.400 in conservation biology and that kind of thing, but also 0:09:11.480 --> 0:09:15.440 many tribes and indigenous groups and activists and artists and 0:09:15.480 --> 0:09:17.240 kind of other people who care about the desert for 0:09:17.280 --> 0:09:20.640 various reasons. And so they started arguing, you know, ten 0:09:20.720 --> 0:09:26.000 years ago that renewable energy development of this sort sort 0:09:26.000 --> 0:09:29.920 of large scale on what is called undisturbed lands was 0:09:30.000 --> 0:09:33.000 going to threaten deserts and was a problem. It's just 0:09:33.120 --> 0:09:35.800 come to beaty kind of now. And it's come because 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:38.720 there's a new transmission line that's going to be built 0:09:38.760 --> 0:09:41.320 around the state of Nevada. So it's a big triangle 0:09:41.360 --> 0:09:44.720 and that's going to help carry renewable energy but also 0:09:44.960 --> 0:09:49.280 fossil fuel based energy probably and export that to other states. 0:09:49.920 --> 0:09:52.959 So the solar developers are kind of following where these 0:09:52.960 --> 0:09:54.800 transmission lines are likely to be. 0:09:55.480 --> 0:09:59.920 Now, knowing as we do that similar to the water crisis, 0:10:00.080 --> 0:10:03.439 there's a clock ticking here in terms of climate change 0:10:03.840 --> 0:10:06.480 and global warming, and I'm wondering what you think what 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:10.559 it's going to take for us to have I never 0:10:10.679 --> 0:10:14.320 used the word Manhattan Project because that bespeaks war. I 0:10:14.600 --> 0:10:16.640 tend to use the word Apollo Project, where we're going 0:10:16.679 --> 0:10:18.840 to really, really the government's going to get serious about 0:10:18.840 --> 0:10:21.400 spending money on these projects, not waiting for private developers 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:23.000 to do it. What do you think it's going to take. 0:10:23.200 --> 0:10:25.679 What an excellent question. I think we're all we're all 0:10:25.720 --> 0:10:26.800 asking that question right now. 0:10:27.040 --> 0:10:27.360 Yeah. 0:10:27.400 --> 0:10:29.360 And to be clear, just since you were talking about 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:32.040 some of like sort of where nationally we're going to 0:10:32.040 --> 0:10:34.960 be putting renewable energy development, right, I am not. I mean, 0:10:35.880 --> 0:10:38.280 most energy experts agree that we're going to need some 0:10:38.559 --> 0:10:42.079 you know, large scale utility scale solar and wand and renewables. 0:10:42.080 --> 0:10:44.080 So this is not a this is not an argument 0:10:44.120 --> 0:10:47.960 against large scale solar per se. It's a question about 0:10:48.120 --> 0:10:49.960 where we put it and how we're building it out. 0:10:50.400 --> 0:10:53.360 Human settlements are all kind of unsustainable in their own ways, right, 0:10:53.400 --> 0:10:55.840 So some cities need water brought to them, some cities 0:10:55.880 --> 0:10:58.000 need food brought into them, like New York. So it's 0:10:58.000 --> 0:11:00.280 not again, it's not also to say that, you know, 0:11:00.280 --> 0:11:04.199 we've made a terrible mistake creating cities in the Southwest. 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:06.400 I mean, I think there's a few things that are 0:11:06.440 --> 0:11:09.320 missing right now. So one is we don't really have 0:11:09.360 --> 0:11:11.800 good frameworks for large scale planning in the United States. 0:11:11.840 --> 0:11:13.720 And I sort of mentioned this, I think in the 0:11:13.800 --> 0:11:16.520 article in passing, probably in one sentence. But there isn't 0:11:16.920 --> 0:11:19.240 other than the Bureau of Land Management, which isn't really 0:11:19.400 --> 0:11:21.719 staffed or funded for playing this kind of role. There 0:11:21.760 --> 0:11:24.200 is not a federal agency that can make really big, 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:27.959 coordinated decisions about land use. Seems very important. So there 0:11:28.000 --> 0:11:30.800 are you know, there are planned energy corridors like so 0:11:30.880 --> 0:11:34.120 there's a they know where these transmission lines are likely 0:11:34.160 --> 0:11:36.520 to go. There was some federal planning around that, but 0:11:36.559 --> 0:11:41.600 there's absolutely no coordination between different types of activities related 0:11:41.600 --> 0:11:45.679 to renewables, So lithium, geothermal, solar farms, all that can 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:47.760 kind of happen in the same place. All those permits 0:11:47.760 --> 0:11:51.439 are assessed separately. The planning of transmission lines and location 0:11:51.520 --> 0:11:54.800 of substations takes place separately from questions about where to 0:11:54.840 --> 0:11:57.800 put actual solar farms. So all of these things are 0:11:57.800 --> 0:12:00.640 happening in this really piecemeal way that makes it hard 0:12:00.640 --> 0:12:03.800 to make good decisions. And I think also the role 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:07.160 that the federal government is playing is one of kind 0:12:07.160 --> 0:12:09.680 of lowering barriers to private development. Right They've tried to 0:12:09.720 --> 0:12:12.760 make it easier for many good reasons for private developers 0:12:12.840 --> 0:12:15.760 to build out solar, to build out renewables, to reduce 0:12:15.800 --> 0:12:18.080 the financial risks that those companies are taking on to 0:12:18.160 --> 0:12:22.200 do it. Which is good in terms of facilitating you know, 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:25.640 solar happening quickly, it is not as good in terms 0:12:25.720 --> 0:12:30.320 of helping guide projects to the best locations or having 0:12:30.320 --> 0:12:33.120 these kinds of big picture questions in mind. Right, So 0:12:33.160 --> 0:12:36.480 the federal government could be making decisions like should this 0:12:36.559 --> 0:12:39.120 land in central Nevada be part of our twenty five 0:12:39.200 --> 0:12:42.240 y twenty five initiative, which is the goal to build 0:12:42.280 --> 0:12:44.840 out twenty five gigatts of solar by twenty twenty five 0:12:44.880 --> 0:12:46.520 on public lands, or. 0:12:46.480 --> 0:12:48.480 The thirty ontograt for that. 0:12:48.160 --> 0:12:50.319 They're trying to be Yeah, but there's also at the 0:12:50.320 --> 0:12:52.520 same time a thirty by thirty initiative, which is to 0:12:52.520 --> 0:12:54.720 conserve thirty percent of the land mass in the United 0:12:54.720 --> 0:12:57.880 States as you know and whatever they call it, you know, 0:12:57.920 --> 0:13:01.280 intact habitat. And so this land in Nevada be part 0:13:01.280 --> 0:13:03.840 of the energy sort of portfolio or part of the 0:13:03.840 --> 0:13:06.400 conservation portfolio. I mean, those are the kinds of questions 0:13:06.440 --> 0:13:09.800 that I think the federal government could be stepping in 0:13:09.840 --> 0:13:10.680 to help answer. 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:17.720 You're an urban sociologist, describe for our listeners what that is. Yeah. 0:13:17.760 --> 0:13:21.000 So I usually say I'm an urban and environmental sociologist, 0:13:21.120 --> 0:13:23.000 and so a lot of my work is about ideas 0:13:23.040 --> 0:13:26.160 about nature and the environment and how we mobilize them 0:13:26.160 --> 0:13:29.160 when making decisions about the built environment about cities. So, 0:13:29.360 --> 0:13:31.520 before I got my PhD, I worked for the New 0:13:31.559 --> 0:13:32.560 York City Parks Department. 0:13:32.600 --> 0:13:34.760 Actually, so, where are you from. 0:13:34.760 --> 0:13:38.120 Originally I'm actually from Kentucky, but I went to college 0:13:38.160 --> 0:13:39.440 near here. I went to Vassar i. 0:13:39.800 --> 0:13:42.439 Vasa, Yeah, nuts valid, and then you got your PhD. 0:13:44.080 --> 0:13:45.840 Yeah, So I worked here in city government and then 0:13:45.880 --> 0:13:49.000 I stayed here. I worked for a program called Partnerships 0:13:49.000 --> 0:13:52.400 for Parks that was actually a public private partnership, but 0:13:52.400 --> 0:13:56.400 it basically existed, exists, it still exists to get communities 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.480 involved in their city parks and to advocate for them, 0:14:00.040 --> 0:14:02.559 and to also help the parks department work better with 0:14:02.600 --> 0:14:03.000 the public. 0:14:03.640 --> 0:14:06.680 I first moved here in seventy nine to go to NYU, 0:14:07.520 --> 0:14:11.720 and then the Conservancy emerged, and there was all this brief, 0:14:11.760 --> 0:14:17.000 as I recall, debate about what union labor no city 0:14:17.080 --> 0:14:20.040 workers who worked there, how much were they being usurped 0:14:20.680 --> 0:14:23.640 by this private group. Now we have this quasi private 0:14:23.680 --> 0:14:27.160 public marriage of the two. I mean Central Park is 0:14:27.200 --> 0:14:28.320 like a business. 0:14:27.920 --> 0:14:30.800 Now it is. And you know this actually relates to 0:14:30.840 --> 0:14:32.360 the other things we're talking about. I mean it's a 0:14:32.360 --> 0:14:36.320 double edged sword. In the West. I mean, national parks 0:14:36.400 --> 0:14:38.760 are much like Central Park. Right. National parks, as many 0:14:38.800 --> 0:14:42.400 people know, are these very controlled spaces. You're shuttled from 0:14:42.440 --> 0:14:45.880 here to there. They're super crowded, there's lots of infrastructure, bathrooms, 0:14:46.120 --> 0:14:51.120 internet for tourists. It's for tourists. Public lands are like 0:14:51.160 --> 0:14:53.240 the interstitial spaces were I mean, I will just say 0:14:53.240 --> 0:14:56.880 so coming from California, there's a lot of state parks there. 0:14:57.000 --> 0:14:58.840 They don't allow dogs in state parks. So it was 0:14:58.880 --> 0:15:00.480 the middle of COVID and I got dog when I 0:15:00.520 --> 0:15:02.280 moved to California from New York because I didn't know 0:15:02.320 --> 0:15:04.240 what else to do with my time, and so I 0:15:04.320 --> 0:15:06.440 discovered public lands because it was a place you could 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:08.760 take your dog. You can take your dog, you can 0:15:08.760 --> 0:15:12.040 shoot guns, you can ride motorized vehicles, you can live there, 0:15:12.080 --> 0:15:14.640 you can camp for fourteen days without a permit. It's 0:15:14.680 --> 0:15:18.600 a really kind of interesting and amazing place. Again just 0:15:18.640 --> 0:15:21.160 because as an urban nite and a coastal urban nite. 0:15:21.200 --> 0:15:23.840 I really had no sense that this land existed in 0:15:23.840 --> 0:15:26.320 the United States and that it still exists. And it's 0:15:26.360 --> 0:15:27.680 not to say that it's a free for all, but 0:15:27.880 --> 0:15:29.920 those are the kinds of questions that are coming up 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:32.880 now about about these landscapes. I think in a similar way, 0:15:32.960 --> 0:15:37.120 and the changes in parks in New York, I think 0:15:37.480 --> 0:15:41.920 can show us how public relationships to these spaces changes 0:15:41.960 --> 0:15:44.800 so dramatically. Right, Central Park went from being a dangerous 0:15:44.800 --> 0:15:47.040 place that was not particularly valued or was seen as 0:15:47.080 --> 0:15:48.920 like a liability. 0:15:49.080 --> 0:15:50.840 We don't go in the park. Right, the park was 0:15:50.920 --> 0:15:53.200 dangerous as a very dangerous space. 0:15:53.280 --> 0:15:54.800 Yeah, everybody, it's like the mall. 0:15:56.200 --> 0:15:56.480 It is. 0:15:57.960 --> 0:15:58.360 Central Park. 0:15:58.440 --> 0:16:09.360 No, No, No. Urban and environmental sociologist Hillary Angelo. If 0:16:09.400 --> 0:16:14.120 you are interested in conversations about energy sources and our future, 0:16:14.640 --> 0:16:18.160 be sure to check out my episode with journalist Nicholas Narkos, 0:16:18.520 --> 0:16:23.040 who investigated the cobalt rush in the Democratic Republic of Congo. 0:16:23.680 --> 0:16:26.840 Just like chatting with his kid ZICKI. He was working 0:16:26.880 --> 0:16:29.560 in mind since he was three, basically, and then there 0:16:29.600 --> 0:16:31.680 was this moment where I showed him my phone. I said, 0:16:31.720 --> 0:16:34.320 the new iPhone is going for a two hundred dollars 0:16:34.360 --> 0:16:36.840 and everybody there knows that it's going into batteries something 0:16:36.880 --> 0:16:38.960 like fifty percent of the cobalt. Mind there it goes 0:16:39.280 --> 0:16:41.720 into letting my own batteries. How do you feel about this? 0:16:41.760 --> 0:16:43.920 And he was just like, I feel terrible, And I 0:16:44.000 --> 0:16:47.000 think he sort of thought, you know, how can people 0:16:47.120 --> 0:16:50.160 sort of sanction such violence against people like me? 0:16:51.840 --> 0:16:55.920 Hear more of my conversation with Nicholas Narkos that Here's 0:16:56.000 --> 0:17:00.640 the Thing dot org After the break, Hillary Angelo proposes 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:14.200 new ways of thinking for the solar model. I'm ATLEC. 0:17:14.240 --> 0:17:17.800 Baldwin and you were listening to Here's the Thing. For 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:21.200 her article on the solar boom in the West, Hillary 0:17:21.280 --> 0:17:24.000 Angelo dug deep into the history of the area and 0:17:24.040 --> 0:17:27.880 the exploitation of its land. I wanted to know if 0:17:27.920 --> 0:17:31.240 places like Ni County were deemed off limits for development, 0:17:31.640 --> 0:17:33.720 what spaces might be used instead. 0:17:34.800 --> 0:17:37.920 Yeah, it's a great question. People talk about locating large 0:17:37.920 --> 0:17:40.520 scale solar on disturbed lands, that's what they call these. 0:17:40.560 --> 0:17:43.080 So this is sort of industrial I think in terms 0:17:43.119 --> 0:17:45.280 of things like brown Field. So yeah, where there was 0:17:45.320 --> 0:17:48.600 a factory and it's polluted. They talk about areas where 0:17:48.600 --> 0:17:53.560 there was strip mining, and Appalachia so often prison top, yeah, mountaintop. 0:17:53.680 --> 0:17:57.639 So often prisons come to those regions now because they're 0:17:57.680 --> 0:18:00.320 sort of, you know, undesirable land uses. People don't want 0:18:00.320 --> 0:18:02.680 prisons near their houses. But it's also not the best 0:18:03.240 --> 0:18:05.840 thing for a community in Appalachia, right, Maybe you'd prefer 0:18:05.880 --> 0:18:08.920 to have a solar farm in a prison. There's also farmland. 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:11.960 This is in California, so exhausted farmland that can't be 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:13.960 used for farming anymore, or that they don't have water 0:18:14.040 --> 0:18:16.560 to farm on anymore, Like that's another good place for it. 0:18:16.680 --> 0:18:20.440 So yeah, I think those are all possible. 0:18:21.400 --> 0:18:25.640 Now, the energy that could be accessed by the residents 0:18:25.680 --> 0:18:29.240 of Ni County doesn't have to be part of a 0:18:29.320 --> 0:18:32.720 solar farm that they're constructing. You could literally in the 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:35.200 bargaining say you're going to build us our own solar farm. 0:18:35.359 --> 0:18:37.639 In other words, we're going to have free energy for 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:40.720 everybody that lives here, free for the rest of our lives. 0:18:40.880 --> 0:18:42.520 And that's the gift you're going to give us, an 0:18:42.520 --> 0:18:45.240 exchange for us not getting in the way of your project. 0:18:45.440 --> 0:18:50.200 When you say this energy goes elsewhere, that's the reality. 0:18:50.240 --> 0:18:53.280 It goes elsewhere. They don't get it they don't get 0:18:53.320 --> 0:18:56.359 to wet their beak. As we say in the mafia. 0:18:57.440 --> 0:19:00.960 It's tricky to answer that question. It does. Like the 0:19:01.080 --> 0:19:04.520 very simple way that it could be stated is, yeah, 0:19:04.560 --> 0:19:07.480 it goes elsewhere. This is like large scale renewable energy 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:13.000 being generated to send and be purchased by companies. Yeah, exactly. 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:15.880 But you know, as I've heard the Bureau of Land 0:19:15.880 --> 0:19:18.000 Management and other people say, like once you get the 0:19:18.040 --> 0:19:20.560 electrons in the transmission line, that you can't really parse 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:22.399 it out in those ways. So there is a you know, 0:19:22.480 --> 0:19:27.800 obviously there is local energy being generated and used in Baby, 0:19:27.880 --> 0:19:29.720 So I assume they get some of it, but. 0:19:29.840 --> 0:19:32.560 It feels like maybe they should get more of it. 0:19:32.760 --> 0:19:34.440 Maybe they should get more of it. Yeah, I don't 0:19:34.480 --> 0:19:36.960 I don't think. I don't know. I mean, I think, 0:19:37.000 --> 0:19:39.560 you know, again, the bigger question for them is what 0:19:39.720 --> 0:19:42.600 is the economy of this town, And for them, this 0:19:42.760 --> 0:19:46.120 kind of tourism model seems to have a better long 0:19:46.200 --> 0:19:48.920 term future for them, and it makes them less reliant 0:19:48.920 --> 0:19:51.439 on a company that may be kind of here today, 0:19:51.480 --> 0:19:55.280 gone tomorrow. Renewable energy not just solar, but also things 0:19:55.320 --> 0:19:58.000 like lithium and geothermal, Like there's a lot of speculation. 0:19:58.160 --> 0:20:00.679 You know, it's a new in just and so there 0:20:00.680 --> 0:20:02.960 are many companies that are trying to get their hands 0:20:02.960 --> 0:20:05.720 in it. And some of them are good and stable 0:20:05.840 --> 0:20:08.600 and some of them are not. And so they yeah, 0:20:08.640 --> 0:20:10.600 they I think they worry about, you know, becoming a 0:20:10.640 --> 0:20:13.080 new company town basically, and then the company folds. 0:20:13.080 --> 0:20:16.760 And then do you like writing? I do like writing? Yeah, yeah, 0:20:16.760 --> 0:20:18.960 Because I'm not saying this to be kind. What really 0:20:18.960 --> 0:20:20.840 hooked me was that this is such so well written, 0:20:20.840 --> 0:20:23.040 this piece you did you mean you're writing? It is fantastic. 0:20:23.280 --> 0:20:26.879 And I'm an old Harper's junkie. Louis Lappham is an 0:20:26.920 --> 0:20:29.760 old old friend of mine, and I don't mean old chronologically, 0:20:29.760 --> 0:20:32.280 which he's old chronologically too, but he's a dear friend 0:20:32.280 --> 0:20:35.159 of mine. So I'm a big Harper's reader. What are 0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:36.120 you working on now. 0:20:36.080 --> 0:20:37.760 I'm working at a book. So I'm working at a 0:20:37.760 --> 0:20:40.960 book on public lands and the energy transition, so basically 0:20:41.040 --> 0:20:45.000 looking at the future of public lands in some ways 0:20:45.000 --> 0:20:47.320 that we've just talked about, like basically, climate change is 0:20:47.359 --> 0:20:51.320 this moment of large scale transformation. Old infrastructure systems are crumbling, 0:20:51.480 --> 0:20:55.720 old ways of doing life on Earth are crumbling, and 0:20:55.760 --> 0:20:58.720 we're building a bunch of new systems. So I'm curious about, 0:20:58.800 --> 0:21:01.440