(Crossposted at your flippant and irreverant Ohio source for politics and humor, Athens Runaway )

Ohio University is a liberal campus.  Duh.  But, in this Age of Obamaquarius—where presidents flaunt the laws of economics and Congressmen flaunt the formerly immutable laws of politics with near-impunity—is the college where protesting the 1990s’ Gulf War and living on a naked commune is a badge of honor for alumna immune to the laws of economics?

Or, as I’ve long suspected, is Athens actually located in a pocket universe, where dogs talk, birds have human pets, and the laws of physics and economics are different.

I recently received this e-mail, sent by Ohio University’s official “University Announcements” e-mail account, which made me laugh out loud at the childishness of the environmentalist movement:

from Ohio University Beyond Coal <university.announcements@ohio.edu> reply-to beyondcoalou@gmail.com to date Fri, Mar 26, 2010 at 4:25 PM subject Beyond Coal Campaign

Fellow Students,

I am writing you on behalf of the Ohio University Beyond Coal Campaign to ask for your support. It’s time to be responsible, ecologically literate, and proactive.

President McDavis signed the Presidents’ Climate Commitment in March, 2007, pledging to initiate the development of a comprehensive plan to achieve climate neutrality as soon as possible, to initiate actions to reduce greenhouse gases as we work toward carbon neutrality and to make the plan and progress reports available to the public. As fulfillment of that commitment, President McDavis has formed a Sustainability Council that includes faculty, students, and staff, and has charged them with leading the institution’s efforts on this front.  That Council has been working hard, with progress to date reported here: http://acupcc.aashe.org/index.php?page=7 .

But, make no mistake, the bulk of the work is yet to be done. For those willing to take on this challenge of our generation we beseech you to lend us your talents.  There is a place for everyone in this movement and everyone is needed.

While the University’s goals are broad, the Beyond Coal Campaign’s primary goal is to end coal burning on the Athens Campus.  It is our task to find the best alternative energy source for this campus and have it put into effect as soon as possible. Though daunting, this is a goal that has been achieved by other similar campuses and we have help.  The Sierra Club and other affiliates will be supporting us and providing resources and experience.

This goal is achievable but we need your help to do it. If you are interested in joining our cause, email us at beyondcoalou@gmail.com or come to our meeting in Bentley 140, every Wednesday at 6:00 p.m.

The power is yours,

OU Beyond-Coal

The ethics and legality of a university group being allowed to conduct membership drives using the university’s official announcements channel aside, the goals of “OU Beyond Coal” are completely ridiculous.

This is from OU Beyond Coal’s Facebook page:

As you can see, the stated goal of the nationwide, astroturfing campaign is the “[elimination] of dependency on coal-fueled power sources on college campuses across the nation.”

However, what these wannabe hippies and hippiettes fail to realize—or do realize and insist upon their ecotopia, in light of—is that not only do they benefit from the use of coal, but that it’d be insane to convert Ohio University into a “green” campus.

The Lausche Heating Plant, located off-campus and almost on the outskirts of town, is used primarily to heat campus buildings, such as classrooms and dormitories.

According to Clyde Pierce, chief operator at the Lausche heating plant, Lausche Heating Plant operates at around 82% efficiency.  Since Lausche consumes around 884,763,000 BTU of fossil fuels a year, we can calculate the electricity equivalent of Lausche’s heat output.  Some quick math (8.88473e8 BTU to kWH) gives us a ballpark figure of total Heating Plant equivalent input of  259,298.451 kWH—almost 260 MWh.

This means that Lausche Heating Plant puts out, in the form of heat production, 212.625 MWH.  Any alternative power source would have to produce as much—if not more—energy, if Ohio University students were to learn, live, and work in environments that were heated properly and to a temperature that was comfortable and healthy.

According to some back-of-the-envelope calculations I did at Find-Solar.org’s online calculator, if the hippies in Athens got their way, the evil King Coal would have to be replaced by 276,339 square feet of solar panels, or 6.34 acres of nothing but solar panels, at a cost of $24,870,510 (again, ballpark figure).

For reference, 1 football field is roughly equal to 1 acre.  Also, Ohio University President Roderick McDavis’s salary is $380,000 per year.

Also, those 6.34 acres of nothing but solar panels would most likely NEVER pay for themselves in savings.  Here’s a graph of the predicted financial “return” that going green would give Ohio University.  And by “give” I mean “take”, and “financial return” I mean “waste of money:

As you can see, if environmentalists got their way at Ohio University, the closest to “breaking even” we’d get would be 23 million dollars in the red.

In other words, is replacing Lausche Heating Plant worth over 65 overpaid college presidents, and the space equivalent to 6 Peden Stadiums‘ worth of space?  No.

Of course, this is all assuming that every day is sunny, and that the sun is shining on the panels at the same, small angle as possible, all year round.  Given that anyone with a basic understanding of meteorology and geography would know that both assumptions are false, solar power is simply unworkable—the laws of the universe prevent it from being a rational option for large-scale, total-conversion projects, such as the one that the Sierra Club is using brainwashed heads full of mush to propagandize for.

At their hearts, activist environmentalists are nothing more than spoiled children.  They want what they want, and damn the consequences.  Whether it be government employees breaking the law in the name of Mother Gaia or goverment employees calling for the suspension of democracy in the name of Mother Gaia, environmentalists want nothing less than all the toys.