Interest in developing geothermal on the Big Island has picked up momentum during the past few years. But it’s also bringing out some age-old critics and becoming a hot-button issue in this year’s race for Big Island mayor.
This is what Don Thomas, a UH scientist and one of Hawaii’s foremost experts on geothermal, had to say about some recent arguments that Big island residents were making against geothermal:
"Opponents of geothermal were supporting the construction of coal fired power plants on Oahu and did it in the full knowledge that it was coming from the rainforest in Indonesia. It’s absurdly elitest to think that we have a right to destroy other environments to prevent any impact on our local environment. I think it’s just a horrible philosophy to pursue. It basically just perpetuates this idea that we can forever export and defer the impacts on our society. And the whole business of global warming is just one aspect of it. But people who take this attitude that we can’t tolerate any impacts whatever is irresponsible, frankly."Thomas, who has studied geothermal in Hawaii for decades, is set to conduct a new round of studies assessing the energy source’s statewide potential. There could even be viable resources on Oahu