I WANTED TO WAIT until after Sept. 11, a day of remembering, to address one of my utmost concerns regarding the proposed 23-million gallon liquid petroleum tank on Mack Point in Penobscot Bay.

All of the men that attacked us on Sept. 11, 2001 were born in the Middle East. The petroleum coming to Penobscot Bay will be from that volatile region, as well as from Russia. But it is not even coming to heat our homes, like all industrial fuel, it will be sold to the highest bidder on the international market, mostly to Canada, it has been reported.

So, why haven't we had enough of this involvement with foreign oil? It has led us to pollution and endless war. Even if you don't believe in global warming, you cannot deny the poisonous pollution created by fossil fuels. Try sitting in your closed garage with just one car running.

My son is a tradesman in Searsport and finding work has been hard, but we are more concerned for long term future for his family, as well as the future of the entire Penobscot Bay. We no more support importing volatile fuel from the Middle East to Waldo County, than we would support legalizing gambling and prostitution here.

Because jobs are jobs? No, they are not. Good jobs do not pollute or exploit human weaknesses nor do they threaten nature or the community at large.

The only similar tanks on the east coast are in large unpopulated, industrial, hell-on-earth areas. Many of us feel that destroying the beauty of Penobscot Bay is much like killing the goose that laid the golden egg.

Searsport will get a purported $400,000, or so, a year in tax revenues from DCP. Seems to many of us that Searsport is selling itself, along with the rest of us, very, very short.

In 1931, not long before he died, Thomas Edison said to his friends Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone: "I'd put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don't have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that."

Yet, we here in Maine have an even better source of energy. Where wind towers are noisy and unsightly, and solar is iffy on cloudy days, the tides keep coming and going, twice a day. It is already happening in Cobscook Bay.

Thinking to our strengths of innovation and local resources is far better for the future of our region than giving in to the lure of the quick buck and few job.

Susan Guthrie lives in Belfast.