(VA GOP) Energy bill generates heat

[jpak]

http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/wb/xp-54552

Gas- and oil-drilling rigs and electricity-generating windmills off the coast. A liquid natural gas port and oil refineries onshore. Nuclear and coal-fired power plants and more windmills inland. Solar panels. Tax breaks for energy-efficient appliances and clean-running, gas-sipping cars.

All this and more is part of the vision of Virginia's future that Sen. Frank Wagner, R-Virginia Beach, lays out in his Virginia Energy Plan.

It's a vision that disturbs environmentalists.

"The Virginia Energy Plan was basically written by big energy companies like AEP and Dominion to basically subsidize their existence," Sierra Club activist Joshua Low said last week.

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[phantom power]

1. The phrase "clean coal" is the most attrocious bit of double speak

in the entire national discourse on energy (to the extent that we have any discourse). I cringe at the thought of the millions of Americans who hear "clean coal" and think to themselves "well, we've got nothing to worry about! We've got all the clean coal we need!"