Solar power reaches southern W.Va. coalfields

[jpak]

http://www.kentucky.com/2011/02/02/1620342/solar-power-reaches-southern-wva.html

A group devoted to creating alternative energy jobs in Central Appalachia is building a first for West Virginia's southern coalfields region this week - a rooftop solar array, assembled by unemployed and underemployed coal miners and contractors.

The 40- by 15-foot array going up on a doctor's office in Williamson is significant not for its size but for its location: It signals to an area long reliant on mining that there can be life beyond coal.

People were skeptical when the idea was first floated about a year ago, says Nick Getzen, spokesman for The Jobs Project, which is trying to create renewable energy job opportunities in West Virginia and Kentucky. In the southern coalfields, he says, people have only ever gotten electricity one way - from coal-fired power plants.

"This is the first sign for a lot of folks that this is real, and that it's real technology, and they can have it in their communities," Getzen says. "In no way are we against coal or trying to replace coal. There's still going to be coal mining here. This is just something else to help the economy."

<more>

[Nihil]

1. How long before some dipstick throws a brick at it?

Still, it's good to see it happening - especially for this reason:
> It signals to an area long reliant on mining that there can be life beyond coal.

It should give some hope, not just to the currently unemployed coal miners who
worked on it but to the others (well, the smart ones anyway) who are capable of
looking at the future and working things out ...

:shrug:

(rec'd)