Recently I received a forwarded email, the kind many of us get every day, from a friend who read a story, purported to be true, about a weather report supposedly printed in the Marquette Mining Journal a few years ago.

The weather report went as follows:

“Up here in the Northern part of Michigan we just recovered from a Historic event—- may I even say a “Weather Event” of “Biblical Proportions”—- with a historic blizzard of up to 44” inches of snow and winds to 90 MPH that broke trees in half, knocked down utility poles, stranded hundreds of motorists in lethal snow banks, closed ALL roads, isolated scores of communities and cut power to 10’s of thousands. And guess what; no one howled for the government. FEMA was not called on to send assistance. Our Mayor’s did not blame the President or anyone else. Our Governor did not blame anyone either. CNN, ABC, CBS, FOX, or NBC did not visit – or even report on this category 5 snow storm. 

“No one looted. Nobody – I mean Nobody demanded the government do something. Nope, we just melted the snow for water. Sent out caravans of SUV’s to pluck people out of snow-engulfed cars. The truck drivers pulled people out of snow banks and didn’t ask for a penny.”

The email story included amazing photos of snow drifts so high they towered over road crews working to clear the way. It turns out that although some of the “facts” in the email were true, the story was not. It seems various versions of the story have been circulating on the internet for several years. Like many of the forwarded emails we get, the mixing of some “facts” and a compelling story makes for good reading, takes on a life of its own, and is often changed to meet the readers’ or sender’s needs. I am sure if I lived in North Dakota the “weather bulletin” would have been printed in the Bismarck Tribune.

The “facts” are that the weather report did not come from Northern Michigan nor was it reported in the Marquette Mining Journal, and it does not appear that it ever was a real weather report. The “report” can be traced back to an October 2005 snowstorm that hit the Dakotas, Montana and Wyoming. A National Weather Service report said the storm had been the earliest on record to hit the area. And, a request did in fact go to FEMA seeking assistance. As for hearty citizens plucking stranded motorists from their cars, I am sure that did happen, although the bulk of the digging fell to police, emergency workers and the National Guard, which were mobilized to help, as is often the case following serious weather events. As for the pictures, it turns out they were from the opening of the Trans Labrador Highway in Northeastern Canada and were going around the internet in 2004.

What this story does show me is that often you have to take most every “story” with a grain of salt and work to separate the “facts” from the “truth.” For example, there was recently a report on the status of net metering (an incentive where owners of small renewable energy systems get retail credit for at least part of the electricity they generate) in Michigan. The report cited several conclusions that caused me to dig in a little deeper, and here’s what I found:

Claim: Solar PV (photovoltaic energy) is approaching price parity, in other words, the cost of generating electricity by solar devices is becoming competitive with other sources of electricity.

Fact: Actual data (teammidwest.com/documents/EconomicAnalysisJan-Oct.pdf) from Midwest Energy’s renewable energy park in Cassopolis shows that the cost of generation from their 4-kilowatt solar installation for the period January through October 2009 was $.88 per kilowatt hour (kWh) generated. Larger solar installations (for example, a 500-kilowatt flat roof mounted system, not including back-up) are closer to $.20 per kWh in sunny climates. However, in cloudy climates the same system would have a generation cost of about $.43 per kWh, according to industry sources (solarbuzz.com/SolarPrices).
Electricity from conventional sources is about 5 to 7 cents per kWh.

Claim: “The number of net metering customers in Michigan has doubled, which demonstrates the high interest electric customers have in generating renewable electricity at home and selling back excess power to their electric utility. 

Fact: Yes, the number of net metering customers has doubled each year. In real numbers, the state had fewer than 50 net metering projects statewide in 2007 and we are now up to about 250. Considering there are approximately 4.5 million electric customers statewide, I might question the statement that this demonstrates a “high interest” among electric customers in producing electricity at their homes and businesses with renewable energy.

As with the story of the winter weather report, you sometimes have to look past the interesting parts and dig into the facts. Although the “facts” may be true, the conclusions drawn from those facts may not be the whole story.