By  Clif Knight 

Given the severe measures now being taken to combat so-called climate change, human lifestyles are on course to face unreal and dangerous challenges in the near future. 

“Bah! Humbug!” to those progressives who believe the answer to a safe environment is doing away with fossil fuels and replacing them with solar panels and windmills. I don’t have an argument with rooftop solar panels being used to provide the electricity needed to operate a single-family residence, but to apply them as the resource to power up a city or state – as do existing power grids operated by natural gas – raises a different question.  

I’ve seen large wind farms in California, operating on a windy day to generate electric power for customers in nearby cities. I asked the question, “What do they do when the wind isn’t blowing?” I don’t think they’d work very well in Morgan County. 

When it comes to motor transportation, the federal government is already taking the lead in replacing gas-consuming automobiles and trucks with new models powered by battery-operated engines. President Joe Biden has sped up the transition by promising to have 500,000 battery recharging stations in service during his term in office. 

What will happen to the many millions of cars and trucks that depend on gas or diesel, and the many businesses that service them, when the fuel supply no longer exists? Will antique vehicles and shows become a thing of the past? Will the government offer a buyout for the leftover gas burners, or will they land in a junkyard or be parked and abandoned in the back yards of their owners? 

Today’s grand old motor vehicles are not the only gas burners that face extinction.  

What about the millions of lawnmowers, weed eaters, blowers, edgers, shrubbery trimmers and garden tillers that are used weekly to maintain private and public property? To meet climate change guidelines, they too would have to go to the junkyard and be replaced with new battery-operated models.  

It looks like the changes we’ll have to make in the not-to-distant future can be summed up by three words: expensive, time-consuming and stressful.