Columnist Susan Snyder: Idea for energy is a breeze

Monday, Dec. 8, 2003 | 8:23 a.m.

Even an ill wind would be welcome to a group of people studying the prospect of generating electricity with breezes in Northern Nevada.

Officials from the San Diego-based Bureau of Land Management and SeaWest WindPower Inc. plan to erect wind-monitoring towers in the Pine Nut Mountains east of Minden later this spring to test the possibility of using Nevada's relentless wind to make electric power, the Associated Press reported last week.

During spring and fall it seems wind is about the only thing more constant in Nevada than casino returns. Still, it may not be consistent enough to generate power.

Maybe the group should wait until 2005 and erect the wind towers outside the Nevada Legislature building in Carson City from February to May.

The air blowing out of the state legislative session not only is constant, it's already hot.

Still, just when it seems you cannot stand another minute stuck in traffic on the 215 Beltway or gaze once more upon the pale, brown haze that passes for local air quality, stories from other places come along to brighten the day.

Read on.

Habitat for Humanity's image is sucking wind in Colorado, where the Associated Press has reported that the do-gooders of housing are exterminating a colony of prairie dogs to make way for houses. The group that uses armies of volunteers to build homes for families who otherwise can't afford them plans to build houses for about 60 families on a piece of land near Greeley. Alas, the 175 prairie dogs that considered the land their home first won't leave.

Habitat tried to move the dogs to another location, but to no avail. Once the construction permits were issued they had to start building or be in violation of local codes, the AP reported.

The report doesn't say how they eradicated the pups.

But whatever method they used might be good for clearing the vermin out of the U.S. Capitol.

Elections no longer seem effective.

It almost sounds like a bad reality series.

(Is there any other kind?)

Starbucks meets the Clampetts.

After what could only have been months -- maybe even years -- of hand-wringing and acidic one-liners, the megastore of coffee has saturated all 50 states with its recent move into West Virginia.

West Virginia, where a hungry Appalachian family of four can eat for a week on what it costs to buy one double-shot-happy-frappy-whatever-it-is.

The company had stores in Korea and Japan before they could justify opening them in West Virginia.

Don't call. I know West Virginia is a beautiful place full of wonderful people who have senses of humor.

But one has to wonder how coffee orders will be taken. A recent survey by the National Literacy Institute showed 56 percent of adult West Virginians ranked in the lowest two literacy categories. Nearly half of those ranked at the lowest level, meaning they can't find an intersection on a map.

They ought to have a ball with a system that calls a small cup of coffee "tall." Then again, maybe it'll be the one place the system makes sense.