Thoughts on Solar by Run on Sun's Founder & CEO, Jim Jenal

We don’t usually borrow from other blogs (although we have seen our work re-appear in other locations from time-to-time) but this piece over at the Climate Denial Crock of the Week titled: A Republican Meteorologist: Acknowledging Climate Science Doesn’t Make You a Liberal, was so good, so important, that we really felt that this needed to be shared as widely as possible.

Paul Douglas is a Minnesota meteorologist and, as he puts it, “I am a moderate Republican, fiscally conservative; a fan of small government, accountability, self-empowerment, and sound science.  I am not a climate scientist.  I’m a meteorologist, and the weather maps I’m staring at are making me uncomfortable.  No, you’re not imagining it: we’ve clicked into a new and almost foreign weather pattern.”

Douglas then goes on to layout the reasons why he believes that climate change is real - and no, he doesn’t rely upon Al Gore.  But neither is he swayed by Bill O’Reilly or talk radio.  Instead, he relies upon the scientists who have studied this for thirty years and who have gone from, again in his words, “concerned [to] bordering on apoplectic.”

It is really a wonderful piece - well written and well-reasoned.  Here is one more (extended) quote:

Climate Change: The Ultimate Test for Capitalism. Let The Markets Work

I’m an entrepreneur. The eight Minnesota companies I’ve created ultimately employed hundreds of professionals. Where others see chronic problems I see opportunity. One of my companies is Smart Energy, with a new level of wind forecast accuracy for global wind farms. Last summer, in response to the most severe two years since 1816, my partners and I launched a new, national cable weather channel (“WeatherNation Television”) – to keep Americans updated with 24/7 storm reports. “Global Weirding” has arrived. Why bother? Because it’s the right thing to do. And because going green will generate green. As in profits. We won’t drill our way out of this challenge; we’ll innovate our way into a new, lower-carbon energy paradigm. Something we’re pretty good at. Professional skeptics will hold up Solyndra as a reason why this will never work. For the sake of our nation’s future – don’t believe them.

“The Mother of All Opportunities”: Turning America Into The Silicon Valley of Energy

We can figure this out. Frankly, we won’t have a choice. But I’m a naïve optimist. We can reinvent America, leaving us more competitive in the 21st century, launching thousands of new, carbon-free energy companies – supplementing, and someday surpassing anything we can expeditiously suck out of the ground and burn, accelerating an already-warming planet. We don’t have to bury our heads in Saudi sand – we’ll never “frack” our way to a sustainable future. It’s time for a New Energy Paradigm. There’s no silver bullet. But there’s plenty of (green) buckshot, if we aim high and point America in the right direction.

As one of those “new, carbon-free energy companies,” at Run on Sun we completely agree with this reasoning.  And frankly, we don’t understand how one can claim to be conservative but not be concerned about conserving the environment upon which everything else in life is based.  Thankfully, some like Douglas totally get it and we can only hope that by speaking up - and having their statements repeated by others - they will encourage other true conservatives to step forward and acknowledge the simple truth - you don’t have to be a liberal to believe in climate change.

You owe it to yourself to give the entire piece a read.  Here’s the link: A Republican Meteorologist: Acknowledging Climate Science Doesn’t Make You a Liberal.