GOP gubernatorial hopeful Bruce Blakeman is entirely right to blast Gov. Kathy Hochul’s “toxic” battery-farm plans as “putting New Yorkers in danger.” [some emphasis, links added]
The Nassau County exec wants a statewide ban on the massive lithium-ion-battery sites, whose purpose is simply to store power to make up for shortages created by Hochul’s extreme green agenda.
As Blakeman notes, “Lithium-ion-battery fires can escalate quickly, release toxic chemicals into the air, resist traditional firefighting methods, and place extreme demands on emergency personnel — especially when water, a standard firefighting tool, can make the blaze worse.”
Case in point: Last week’s toxic battery fire in Warwick — the second blaze at the plant since 2023.
The gov’s spokesman on these issues, Ken Lovett, says the battery farms are needed to “deal with potential energy shortages as soon as next year,” but that threat is rooted purely in Hochul’s hostility to traditional sources of electricity.
The state’s climate law mandates a switchover to renewables like wind and solar in the push to “decarbonize” the state’s electric grid by 2040, but those renewables are terribly unreliable, hence the “need” for the massive battery farms to store power for when the wind doesn’t blow, or the sun goes down.
Instead of rushing to install battery farms everywhere, the state needs to push hard and fast to get reliable, natural-gas-burning electric plants built.
Bad enough that Hochul refuses to admit that her green agenda poses a dire threat to New York; it’s even more shameful that she’s deepening the danger with her risky battery-farm mandates.
Top image of the Warwick, NY, battery-farm fire via News 12/YouTube screencap
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