Post 48 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.
There’s a question that I omitted from Post 46 (Questions on the 9.17.15 Remarks on Waste Importation). The question concerns Whitewater City Manager Clapper’s description of how trucks would bring imported waste into the city:
….So, umm, and an inadequate site, any big trucks that come in have to snake through, they come down a long road by the power plant and by John’s Disposal…
Earlier in this series, we saw that the Donohue firm described selling water as a key goal for municipal government (“The option of producing a sellable water product is of major interest for the city…. The target would be to potentially sell this water product to the adjacent power plant.” See, Post 19, The Scope of Donohue’s Work (Part 1)).
It’s odd, about water sales, because although Donohue says that they’re very important to city government (a ‘major interest’), there’s no prominent mention of those sales in the principal slides on this project, and no mention of sales even when Mr. Clapper mentions the power plant in his explanation of waste importation.
Since no one imagines that water sales depend on water production from rain dances, or by finding supplies with dowsing rods, there’s an obvious relationship between waste into the wastewater plant and extraction of water from it.
That relationship, just as obviously depends on quantity: nothing in, nothing out.
There are other business and economic relationships to consider, too (what deals, if any, have been promised to the power plant, and who has an interest in that plant?).
The more one looks at all this, the more omissions from the municipal administration one finds (even at times when an explanation would have been easy, relevant, and material).
Whether that’s a consequence of repeated carelessness, or by calculated method, I’m not yet sure.
WHEN GREEN TURNS BROWN: Mondays @ 10 AM, here on FREE WHITEWATER.
The whole plan is superficial.
Good thoughts about possible angles behind this.
It’s a shady plan through and through.
If people only looked at the wastewater director or city manager it would be really hard to explain how long this project has gone on. They really show no aptitude to honestly, competently run a program like this. It’s that bad. It could be a case study in what not to do. So maybe there is a basis for wondering if a more powerful behind the scenes person is pushing these guys forward?