I was born and raised on the Eastside. I am a philosophy professor living in Bellevue and Hong Kong. Thank you for reading my concern over the Energize Eastside Project.
After analysis, this project is primarily a money-making scheme. It’s a regressive engineering concept and a foreign-owned project forcing “growth projections” already negated by traffic woes.
Traffic is going to forestall the growth Puget Sound Energy (PSE) needs to justify extra power lines. But it’s strange how PSE has not constructed a transparent rational argument. The argument flows between profit for investors in Australia, power for Canada and demand for energy in a future time.
They cannot justify this project here and now on grounds qualifying sound future projections. But once one tower is put up, people will be shocked at the monstrosity. Like in Northern California, one tower goes up people will rise up and stop it.
Moreover, the project will fell 8,000 trees we need for the heavy traffic we have now.
Many of these trees are hundreds of years old, massive filters vital to clean air. And we need these trees to protect us from the new onslaught of pollution from China coming over in the jet stream. Trees are going too fast. Over 300,000 acres of trees burnt last summer in Washington state!
I flew to Hong Kong one week ago and traveled over land up through British Columbia, Alaska and down through Siberia and China. It was daylight the whole time and I had a window seat. It was shocking to see the logging and then the absence of trees.
The Energize Eastside Project will stain the company and all associated with it for an indefinite period of time. They don’t even entertain sophisticated technological solutions.
This power line will look hideous and make the skyline of Bellevue look industrial. Bellevue was named the No. 2 city to live in America by the Wall Street Journal (last year).
It truly is the city in a park. One must really understand how special this area is by going to other areas in the world and then one is shocked by our oasis. Anyone associated with this project will be ugly for life. It’s surprising that a multinational corporation can push such bad engineering and technology forward in a sophisticated technological hub. This must be stopped.
Julian von Will
Bellevue
