My friend Sandy Nax has called the Valley a Petri dish for alternative energy development because it has so many of the necessary attributes: available land, scorching sun and/or clear days a majority of the year, wind in the mountains and scads of agricultural resources for biofuel or biogas.
Sandy has often said, "Clean energy could be a game changer." He was referring to the economy.
Sandy and I discuss the attributes of the sorry state of economic affairs that have devastated the region's real estate, toppled government tax revenues and put many of our neighbors out of work.
Changing the world
We used to work in the newspaper business, which hasn't fared well these past several years. As part of our jobs writing and editing business stories, we spent years analyzing trends and making sense of them.
This clean energy trend has been fascinating to watch. I still have no idea where it's going and what particular component will be the first to fuel jobs, but indicators have been extremely positive.
