Dear Editor,

There are no facts to back up any of Mr. Fonzi’s conjecture in his recent Opinion column, “A Dark Green Power Failure,” and I’m not even sure what his point is. Don’t invest in renewable resources? Don’t deregulate the power grid?

Or maybe he’s saying we should invest more in California’s power infrastructure so that the entire power grid doesn’t go down when we suffer from a natural disaster, such as a fire? I can get behind that.

It is well-published (you can google “wind turbines in Texas”) that one of the largest contributing factors to the failed power grid in Texas was the inability to get natural gas out because no one had winterized the pipes, and things were freezing. No one invested in the infrastructure to make sure gas would still flow even during these rare winter storms.

Wind and solar power make up a fraction of the power supply in Texas because “Texas is a gas state.”

Why demonize renewable energy sources with conjecture and opinion?

And let’s get back to the whole point of Community CHOICE Energy. All that is before the City Council is to give the people a CHOICE of where they want to get their energy from. No one is making anyone do anything. People have a choice to put solar on their house, and they should have a choice to get their power from renewable sources. Why shouldn’t people have that choice?

I still don’t really understand why Atascadero continues to deny the choice to the people of this town. Even if Atascadero opts-in, no one is forced to do anything. You can still get all your power from PG&E if you want to. But if you don’t want to, there should be another option.

Tori Keen, Atascadero Resident