How difficult is it to build transmission lines in the US? In Germany we have enormous problems building a transmission line from the offshore windparks in the north to the industrial centers in the south. NIMBYs are opposing it fiercly.
There is always pushback from locals (understandable), but there has been billions in transmission built in the Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, and West Texas regions to name a few areas. A lot of this is to help with the existing (ageing) infrastructure as well as helping make sure the ~22GW of currently built wind capacity can actually serve load and not be curtailed 24/7. In fact, a lot of that wind wouldn't have been built without the necessary transmission. Keep in mind that there is greater than a ~2:1 return on investment from these projects (difference in production cost in a year with the projects there and then not there) if I recall correctly.
The Western Interconnect of the US seems to favor using RAS and phase-shifting transformers in order to avoid as many transmission projects. A Remedial Action Scheme is basically an automated system that keeps certain catastrophic events from happening when a certain triggering event happens. Phase shifting transformers can help push back on certain interregional flows. I think this makes more sense in the Western Interconnect as it isn't as much of a dense network as the Eastern Interconnect. You have dense load centers in Denver, California, and Oregon/Washington with a dessert and mountain range in the middle (forms a donut). It is very rural over the vast majority of the distance, so I imagine transmission is pretty expensive and harder to justify. They do have interregional planning groups in the West though.
A little NIMBY/FUD goes a long way.
Windmills are a bit of an eyesore compared to a great natural scene.
I'd rather go nuclear in select ugly places.
What is beautiful is good. He who creates ugliness is evil.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Also, I have a deep aversion for relativism.
Nuclear is better, though, in the short term.
However what 2+ degrees of warming will do will dwarf anything that the turbines will do.
There are also arguments about birds dying and the such. Only that's a BS argument considering that glass buildings kill 10x as many birds and are ubiquitous.
Also, nuclear has the whole radioactive waste and potential meltdown thing, which wind does not.
Both American continents still have a lot of land that's completely unutilized, not even by any nature worth preserving.
State and local governments are better suited for addressing the issues of their constituents.
For intriguing stories, read about opposition to the Plains & Eastern Clean Line through Arkansas, the Grain Belt Express Clean Line through Missouri, and the story of the Wind Catcher in Arkansas. Compare and contrast this with otherwise generous laws concerning utility easements in Arkansas.