Like most Easterners, I’ve never been to Rockford, Illinois. On a map it looks about halfway between Chicago and Milwaukee but inland, located on the banks of the Rock River. To the east is Boone County, known for corn and a community solar project.
There’s opposition, like the person who read on the internet that solar panels poison groundwater; as the project pointed out, the chemical fertilizers foul tap water in this part of Illinois. The solar project seeded its landscape with wildflowers making it a great wildlife habitat.
There’s still a great deal of opposition to solar in areas that really don’t understand its importance. Many people are still in the fossil fuel mentality. As one supporter of this project noted, opposition is not economic, but cultural, tied into images of the secular and godless East. People need to see that solar is important to preserving God’s creation; it’s the mindset that permits strip mining and oil rigs spewing dirt that isdestructive.
Prayer for the Day
Your creation, O God, speaks to us in different ways,
From glass panels reflecting the sun to wildflowers in a field;
You have created us, O Lord, with minds and imagination,
So we are able to discover new ways to live.
Be with us, O Holy One, so we are able to transcend
The limitations that uncertainty creates.
In the name of the One who always questioned,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
A photovoltaic panel is almost astonishingly efficient—20 times more efficient than the solar collector we call a corn plant.
Bill McKibben, environmentalist, Middlebury College, Vermont
Some of the worst [people who oppose the solar project] are progressives—they always begin by saying ‘I’m a big supporter of renewables, but not here.’
Hal Sprague, Boone County Solar Project
The heavens are telling the glory of God, and the firmament proclaims God’s handiwork;
Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night declares knowledge.
There is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard,
Yet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.
Psalm 19: 1-4