Post 41 in a series. When Green Turns Brown is an examination of a small town’s digester-energy project, in which Whitewater, Wisconsin would import other cities’ waste, claiming that the result would be both profitable and green.
Sometimes a presentation of options is genuine; other times one option is merely a straw proposal to make a second option seem more palatable, less extreme, etc.
As we’ve seen, at the 12.16.14 presentation to Common Council, the Donohue firm presented two slides, about two supposed options for a digester-energy project in Whitewater. (See, The December 2014 Presentation (Part 1), The December 2014 Presentation (Part 2), and The December 2014 Presentation (Part 3).)
(Every question in this series has a unique number, assigned chronologically based on when it was asked. All the questions from When Green Turns Brown can be found in the Question Bin. Today’s questions begin with No. 267.)
Set aside for a moment – just for a moment – that the Trane study as has been publicly published amounts to no more than a slide and the profession of a few others that there was, in fact, a completed study.
267. Considering the slides above, and the claims of city officials (City Mgr. Clapper, Wastewater Superintendent Reel) and Donohue that what Whitewater might do now is a ‘baby-steps’ program, isn’t it clear that the supposed second option is merely a thin-entering wedge for large-scale waste importation into the city?
(Even Donohue‘s description of Trane‘s alleged work implies as much, when one sees that Donohue begins by asking “does it make sense to build everything at once?” – emphasis added. There’d be no need for ‘at once’ if Donohue and city officials did not plan, now, for a larger program of importing waste into Whitewater, later).
268. Under the supposedly baby-steps program, as outlined in slide 2, how much waste by volume would have to be trucked into the city to achieve the claimed revenue projections?
269. Under the supposedly baby-steps program, as outlined in slide 2, how much waste could be trucked into the city?
WHEN GREEN TURNS BROWN: Mondays @ 10 AM, here on FREE WHITEWATER.