Almost every point in Mark Sertoff’s letter last week, “Renewable energy and Europe” (Village Times Herald, Aug, 21), is either false, misleading, disingenuous or too vague to address. In any case, his arguments appear to be standard propaganda from the fossil fuel industry.
Point 7, which claims that climate change is a global scientificconspiracy, is plainly false. This point is crucial because no one would be advocating for alternative energy sources so urgently if the effects of climate change were not clear and devastating. Thirty years ago, questioning climate science might have been plausible; today, it is simply absurd. Anyone over the age of 45 has personally witnessed these changes. For example, summers in North America are now about two weeks longer than they were in 1980.
All the concerns raised about the ecological and social impacts of renewable energy industries are disingenuous. The current fossil fuel economy has caused far greater environmental damage over many decades.
Are we to believe that oil and gas executives and shareholders genuinely care about issues like child labor in the developing world, animal deaths or habitat destruction?
Why are ”fossil” and “nuclear” mentioned together repeatedly? Because nuclear energy does not contribute to climate change, and therefore it naturally aligns with wind and solar in these discussions. However, nuclear power is not intermittent. Nor is hydropower, which is conveniently omitted. These sources weaken the arguments that alternative energy cannot ensure a reliable energy supply, so they mustbe disassociated with alternatives.
Regarding other countries’ actions, China installed more solar capacity last year than the entire current capacity of the United States. Has China been duped by the so-called Green Dream or the liberal agenda?
The breathless panic over “shivering” and “pipes freezing” suggests that anyone is proposing a complete shift to wind and solar energy alone. No one is advocating this. All experts and policymakers support a hybrid, incremental transition that grows a profitable green energy economy while gradually reducing reliance on the most damaging fossil fuels.
As I have argued previously in these pages, if radical free-market fundamentalists — who believe everything should be left to unregulated business — disagree with collective action against global climate change, they should openly make that case. However, they must drop the pretenses and honestly admit that the rest of us will suffer heavy climate-related costs to maintain their corporate profits.
John Hover
East Setauket
Published August 28, 2025 in the Three Village Herald.
https://tbrnewsmedia.com/letters-to-the-editor-aug-28-2025/
in response to letter "Renewable Energy and Europe", August 21, 2025
https://tbrnewsmedia.com/letters-to-the-editor-august-21-2025/
