Letters to the Editor: Don’t like oil spills? Then stop utilities from hobbling rooftop solar

To the editor: “It doesn’t have to be like this” — Lorraine Aguilar’s words, quoted in one of your articles, express what so many of us are feeling in the wake of this disaster. This oil spill fouling beaches primarily in Orange County was predictable, but not inevitable.

It is well past time that we shift away from fossil fuels, and rooftop solar is our golden ticket to a clean energy future. After all, there has never been a solar spill.

And yet, even as oil rots the ocean and our forests continue to burn, the big utilities are lobbying the California Public Utilities Commission to double the cost of rooftop solar by slapping on fees and slashing solar credits. If we want to prevent another oil spill, we need Gov. Gavin Newsom and the CPUC to protect our access to clean energy sources like rooftop solar.

We missed our chance to stop this catastrophic oil spill. We cannot afford to miss our chance to protect rooftop solar.

Cailey Underhill, Long Beach

The writer is a field organizer with the group Green Corps.

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To the editor: Pipeline oil and ocean water don’t mix — or at least they shouldn’t. However, due to inadequate pipeline maintenance, carelessness or the accidental collision of anchor to pipeline, that catastrophic mixture of oil and salt water has happened far too frequently, as demonstrated by the recent spill.

Nevertheless, since the 1940s, the oil industry has installed 40,000 miles of offshore pipeline. What the latest spill demonstrates is that oil infrastructure does not belong in the ocean. The costs — both environmental and economic — are simply too great.

Whether sourced from land or sea, the Earth is storing between 40 and 50 years of remaining oil. On the bright side, there are more than 5 billion years of solar energy left for us to tap into. Hopefully we will choose wisely.

Linda Nicholes, Huntington Beach

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To the editor: The photos of beach cleanup crews caught my attention.

These environmental services personnel are picking up chunks of crude oil and putting them into bags made of petroleum while wearing protective gloves, booties, vests and coveralls also derived from petroleum.

Crude oil is bad enough, but oil processed into items that get short-term use and then continue to contaminate the environment for no one knows how long is even worse.

Margrette Carr, San Diego