Reader comments
Lack of available water rights won't hinder oil-shale projects

YOu heard it first here, folks; the oil shale industry and your elected officials are willing to extinguish the agriculture sector of the Uintah Basin in the development of oil shale.

Water used to cool nuclear power plants (or any thermal power plant, nuclear is just the best), does not have to be wasted to the atmosphere. This warmed water could be used to grow crops or for industrial work or to grow fish. Not done commonly in this country, but it's possible.

It comes down really to choices, about do we want to keep increasing our use of electricity? The fact is that "we" as a population do. Or would we rather use the water for growing cotton and making clothes, or to refine oil shale, or to farm small plots in this area. But read on my post, "we" don't get to make all those choices in these public hearings, other individuals can and do.

De Christopher is wrong to whine about Utah taking water from farmers. Those farmers are very capable of making up their own minds, and they do very often and regularly and independently.

Water naturally flows uphill to money, and since the sky-rocketing oil prices, dictated by OPEC and other global factors, threatens locally-produced food in favor for feeding our addiction to oil and energy.

What's sad is that the free market -- those with the deepest pockets to buy water rights -- will drive agriculture out and essentially render fertile lands worthless as people will not want to live near smelly oil-shale projects or radioactive nuclear power plants, and the lack of water will no longer allow agriculture jobs.

Moreover, the nuclear power plant is said that it is expected to ship its power out of state, so we're literally sacraficing a local industry to feed the electricity needs of California.

If Aaron Tilton becomes Lt. Governor as rumor has it, we may not be able to stop the loss of agriculture in eastern Utah.

60% of our domestic water usage as a state goes into our lawns. Google it it's a fact. if we chose to xeriscape our yards, even just a small section, we would not be in such a major water crises. I believe that we need to start treating water more sacredly if we don't Utah will be in a lot of trouble in the future. I don't understand why people are pushing for a nuclear power plant when there are sooo many other available options that don't require so much water and that have achieved grid parity.

30% of Denmark's energy come from renewable sources 1/10 megawatts produced gets sold to other nations. They have no natural resources to speak of yet they are selling energy that they get from wind and solar and are making quite a profit from it.

Contrary to the enviro rhetoric, development of oil shale does not require vast amounts of water...but SUWA wants to keep that quiet so they can continue their scare tactics and rake in dollars from their sheep.