OPEN FORUM: Let’s end dependency on fossil fuels

By VICKIE SIMMONS

My friends, family and neighbors on the Moapa River Indian Reservation know all too well about the dangers of fossil fuels and the benefits of renewable energy.

That’s why we champion solar in our community and support Question 6, which will guarantee that 50 percent of Nevada’s energy comes from renewables by 2030.

The Moapa Band of Paiutes partnered with First Solar to build the first-ever utility-scale solar array on indigenous lands, generating jobs, capital investments and revenue sources for our government. We have two other solar arrays in the works as well. Our first solar project now sends energy to California. We would prefer to see that energy go to Nevadans. If we pass Question 6, that can be a reality.

We spend more than $700 million on dirty fossil fuels every year in Nevada. It’s time we change that. Only 20 percent of our electricity comes from renewables here. That’s inexcusable.

In 2017, the coal-fired Reid Gardner Generating Station bordering our lands stopped producing electricity. But the memories of its pollution still live with us and our community. The trouble is that Moapa residents still live within a 35-mile radius of four fossil fuel burning power plants. That’s another reason why we need Question 6. By guaranteeing more renewables, we remove millions of metric tons of carbon emissions from our air along with thousands of metric tons of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide.

I watched my brother, a former coal plant worker at the Reid Gardner Generating Station, die at age 31 from cardiomyopathy, also known as an enlarged heart. That was the same thing that killed another young tribal member who also worked at the the plant lived across the street from me.

There are many other stories like mine on our reservation –– morbid tales of those who lived and worked on or near the power plant and died much too young.

In February, a series of infections took the life of our tribe’s former chairman, William Anderson. He was 44 and spent his life fighting to close that power plant. But this should not be surprising.

The chemicals in the coal ash that rained down on us for decades are not average words in someone’s vocabulary or those that are used every day. These chemicals seeped into our soil and into the ground.

Our land and our people were subjected to arsenic, boron, chloride, chromium, magnesium, manganese, molybdenum, nitrate, selenium, sodium, sulfate, TDS, titanium, and vanadium.

Between 2008 and 2012, monitoring wells for groundwater quality showed over 7,000 exceedances of state standards at Reid Gardner.

The retired plant is a less than a ¼ mile from house, and the settling ponds less than 200 yards.

For years, the dusty black coal ash caked our homes, schools, and government buildings. And you can still see it out there.

We weren’t the only ones breathing the dirty air.

The emissions from the plant traveled into the Las Vegas Valley too. They also traveled to places like the Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona, Zion National Park in Utah and Joshua Tree National Park in California. They also traveled into the lungs of many other indigenous and non-native folks living here in the West.

We don’t see emission spitting power plants in wealthy white neighborhoods. But it still travels there. If you live in the heart of North Las Vegas, you live within a 23-mile radius of five fossil-fuel burning power plants. If you live in Summerlin, you’re not that much further away.

That’s why we all need to do our part and take action.  I fought for many years and worked with NV Energy to close Reid Gardner. The status quo doesn’t change itself. Together we can make change.  That’s why we need to pass question 6.

Let’s end our dependency on fossil fuels and start taking care of one another.  Think about Nevada’s sunshine, its wind and its geothermal resources. Think about our future.

Vicki Simmons is a Moapa Band of Paiutes Tribal Member and Tribal Council Liaison to Environmental Committee.