Walmart is an environmental disaster, despite its claim to be moving toward renewable energy. But Walmart's majority stockholders, the Walton family, are going above and beyond, actively working against rooftop solar power, according to a new report from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance.
The Waltons' anti-solar efforts fall into two categories. Since 2010, they've given at least $4.5 million in donations to organizations like the American Legislative Exchange Council and Americans for Prosperity that are trying to weaken clean energy policies at the state level. These donations are part of a widespread corporate attack on policies that allow homeowners to use rooftop solar panels not just to power their own houses, but to sell excess solar power to utility companies. These utility companies might not be against solar power, but they're definitely against losing business to household-level solar. The logic is a familiar one:
... beneath the [Walton] family’s public embrace of environmentalism lies a deeper agenda: furthering the highly concentrated corporate economic model that has generated so much wealth for so few, often at extraordinary cost to both the environment and working people. The Waltons’ environmentalism is best understood not as a curious counterpoint to this imperative, but rather as a tool in service to it.
have you noticed big retail business is not so much into business as usual but interfering in to your life politically, what does Walmart cheap prices sub wage employers have to do with you and solar power for your home? like Koch's what do they have to do with you and your doctor? we are moving toward if not already there an oligarchy and the players are not interested in company.
They put that into very direct action with a solar company, First Solar. Yes, the Walmart Waltons own a solar company. But! First Solar doesn't build solar for households. It builds utility-scale solar arrays, which means its interests are fully aligned with utility companies. Really aligned:
In June 2013, Walton-owned First Solar sent shockwaves through the solar
industry when its CEO, James Hughes, published an op-ed in the Arizona Republic endorsing a proposal by the state’s biggest utility to impose a new fee on households with rooftop solar. Averaging about $50 to $100 a month, the proposed fee would be large enough to completely destroy the economics of household energy production, halting the spread of residential rooftop solar in Arizona. As the rest of the solar industry closed ranks and joined with environmental and consumer groups in opposing the plan, First Solar backed the utility, insisting that it was right to maximize its financial position. Bryan Miller, a vice president at Sunrun and president of the Alliance for Solar Choice, put First Solar’s actions in perspective: “No solar company has publicly advocated against solar until First Solar.”
are they in competition to see who can screw Americans the best these people use republican politicians to accomplish their goals of taking over America a vote for republicans is a vote for the dark days that would come just remember Nov. 5th is too late to say "AH CRAP WHAT HAVE I DONE". and we thought that the right wing was only interested in oil not green fuels truth is they are not interested in it if PRES. is in the big chair. they know this is coming so like oil they want the door opened to them first then they can gauge us like this proposal to gut homeowners today will be new home owners reality later then on to rental properties the shy is not a limit. recognize Nov. 4th their day of reckoning.
