Every government program is a money laundering scheme that takes taxpayers money and puts it into somebody's bank account, usually that of the ones that designed scam while greasing the palms of a few others to keep their mouths shut about the theft.
No surprise that NRDC likely helped to orchestrate this deceptive "greenwash" - though the example focussed on here - "astroturf" - given how small the acreage involved likely will be - seems trivial compared with another behind-the-scene efforts spearheaded by NRDC. When President Obama decided to offer industrial wind energy conglomerates a $4-billion public tax subsidy known as the Production Tax Credit, NRDC actively promoted and successfully lobbied for him to exempt this federal action from the National Environmental Policy Act. Consequently, no assessment at the national level was made of the cumulative environmental impacts resulting from the construction of a thousand miles of new roads, several hundred miles of new powerlines, and more than a thousand new 500-600+ foot spinning rotors (whose blade tips appear to move slowly but in actuality exceed 150 MPH when rotating, and are known to be especially deadly to many species of bats - who can be attracted to a wind turbine's moving blades).
I am a bit puzzled by the "30% protected by 2030" goal since - according to NRDC - 34% of the 2.3-billion acres of land within the US already is owned by both the US Government and by the 50 State Governments (see: https://www.nrcm.org/documents/publiclandownership.pdf ). Not sure whether public lands that are managed by local governments - as well as other conservation lands owned by private entities (such as The Nature Conservancy) - were included within this 34% acreage proportion?
Nonetheless, the following article in High Country News dispells the myth that the lands slated to be among the "30% protected" would be managed as "wilderness" - see:
The majority of acreage under federal or state ownership in the US is actively managed for some form of commodity production - e.g., wood fiber, livestock, etc. Biodiversity and "natural beauty" are but secondary considerations - at best - on most of our nation's public lands. The concept of having "public lands" managed primarily for the "goods and services" and "public needs" that private lands either cannot or do not provide --- is largely ignored or dismissed by those currently responsible for the management of public lands.
The 30x30 initiative is breathtaking in its ambition and scope, so as long as the astroturf acreage stays relatively low, I'd say it's still worthy of support. Surprisingly, conservation often has bipartisan support -- Trump even signed the "Great American Outdoors Act" back in 2020 -- so there is hope...
If you guys learn of any other astroturf playgrounds funded through "America the Beautiful" please let me know by posting links to them. Thank you!
There is no public program that does not have toxic profiteers behind it, sigh.
Every government program is a money laundering scheme that takes taxpayers money and puts it into somebody's bank account, usually that of the ones that designed scam while greasing the palms of a few others to keep their mouths shut about the theft.
Synthetic turf will never qualify as nature and should NEVER be counted toward 30% land conservation!!!!!!!!
No surprise that NRDC likely helped to orchestrate this deceptive "greenwash" - though the example focussed on here - "astroturf" - given how small the acreage involved likely will be - seems trivial compared with another behind-the-scene efforts spearheaded by NRDC. When President Obama decided to offer industrial wind energy conglomerates a $4-billion public tax subsidy known as the Production Tax Credit, NRDC actively promoted and successfully lobbied for him to exempt this federal action from the National Environmental Policy Act. Consequently, no assessment at the national level was made of the cumulative environmental impacts resulting from the construction of a thousand miles of new roads, several hundred miles of new powerlines, and more than a thousand new 500-600+ foot spinning rotors (whose blade tips appear to move slowly but in actuality exceed 150 MPH when rotating, and are known to be especially deadly to many species of bats - who can be attracted to a wind turbine's moving blades).
I am a bit puzzled by the "30% protected by 2030" goal since - according to NRDC - 34% of the 2.3-billion acres of land within the US already is owned by both the US Government and by the 50 State Governments (see: https://www.nrcm.org/documents/publiclandownership.pdf ). Not sure whether public lands that are managed by local governments - as well as other conservation lands owned by private entities (such as The Nature Conservancy) - were included within this 34% acreage proportion?
Nonetheless, the following article in High Country News dispells the myth that the lands slated to be among the "30% protected" would be managed as "wilderness" - see:
https://www.hcn.org/articles/south-politics-a-reality-check-on-bidens-30-by-30-conservation-plan .
The majority of acreage under federal or state ownership in the US is actively managed for some form of commodity production - e.g., wood fiber, livestock, etc. Biodiversity and "natural beauty" are but secondary considerations - at best - on most of our nation's public lands. The concept of having "public lands" managed primarily for the "goods and services" and "public needs" that private lands either cannot or do not provide --- is largely ignored or dismissed by those currently responsible for the management of public lands.
The 30x30 initiative is breathtaking in its ambition and scope, so as long as the astroturf acreage stays relatively low, I'd say it's still worthy of support. Surprisingly, conservation often has bipartisan support -- Trump even signed the "Great American Outdoors Act" back in 2020 -- so there is hope...