Extreme weather

[LesPalenik]

Soon there will be Carbon taxing on international trade, and the laggards will pay dearly.

Bart, do you mean Christine Lagarde? 

[Alan Klein]

Alan, that's nonsense, you're creating a strawman. You do save by having to burn less fossil fuel (and produce less CO2 emission) with free wind and sun. These systems are complementary, and will not totally replace Fossil fuel utility plants.


Are you serious? Since when does the cost in the USA reflect the true cost of energy? Add the cost to society from increased droughts, flooding, Hurricanes, diseases, etc., and you'll get a more realistic comparison.

That's not due to renewable enery. If Germany hadn't added renewables to the mix, then their emissions would have skyrocketed. They do need to scale down the coal-generated energy production, and they are aware of that because they've committed to doing that in the light of the Paris agreements.

You are still searching for arguments for inaction. Time has run out for such games.

Soon there will be Carbon taxing on international trade, and the laggards will pay dearly.

Cheers,
Bart

What do you own stock in these companies? 

Sure you save some emissions.  But you still need the fossil fuel for backup.  It's not like you can shut them down.  So homeowner have to pay for both the new green energy and pay for upkeep of the existing fossil generators. 

Germany's costs are higher than other European countries, not only the USA.  Most Germans are furious about that.  With all the hot weather you're getting, most Germans don;t have and would not be able to afford air conditioning with the cost of electricity being what it became.  CO2 not only comes from the production of electricity.  What about heating, automobiles, factory production, etc.  Speaking of cars, Germany's diesel engines have been adding illegal pollution as well as CO2 to the air at 50-100 times the rate the law allows. 


Regarding taxing on international trade, America has plenty of green energy.  The oil-rich state of Texas has more wind production on it's own than all countries except for five.  America is #2 in the world in green energy.  Hey, we have Tesla cars and Tesla batteries.    In any case, I don;t see how you can place taxes on trade.  If you did, we'd just place a tariff on your goods.  You don; think Trump will let you do that without hitting back, do you?
https://www.power-technology.com/features/wind-energy-by-country/

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Bart, do you mean Christine Lagarde? 

LOL, who knows what she will do when she becomes the new President of the European Central Bank, to replace Mario Draghi ...

Cheers,
Bart

[faberryman]

If you did, we'd just place a tariff on your goods.  You don; think Trump will let you do that without hitting back, do you?

And American consumers would pay the price at the checkout counter.

[Alan Klein]

LOL, who knows what she will do when she becomes the new President of the European Central Bank, to replace Mario Draghi ...

Cheers,
Bart

Trump should warm up to her easier than Dragi. 

[Alan Klein]

And American consumers would pay the price at the checkout counter.

And manufacturing companies will lose business to other suppliers as the prices on their goods go up. 

[Alan Klein]

By the way, fab, placing a energy tax on our goods means that your country's consumers are paying higher prices at the counter as well. Did you forget that works both ways?  It's just a tariff by another name. 

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Sure you save some emissions.  But you still need the fossil fuel for backup.  It's not like you can shut them down.  So homeowner have to pay for both the new green energy and pay for upkeep of the existing fossil generators.

The fuel for solar and wind is free. So that part of the energy production changes to only paying for the infrastructure and maintenance, zero for fuel. So, if the building of the renewable energy plans is affordable (and the first ones are currently being built without the need for subsidies, thanks to the learning experiences and falling costs), the plants can be run at competitive costs. This includes the need for fast starting smaller Fossil fuel plants, which are also cheaper than full-scale plants that cannot throttle up/down as fast, and they use less fuel. 

Germany's costs are higher than other European countries, not only the USA.

Part of that has to do with the more rapid closing of nuclear energy plants. The losses for the owners of those plants need to be compensated. So there are several factors and one-time transition costs that make a simplistic cost comparison like you made, misleading.

CO2 not only comes from the production of electricity.  What about heating, automobiles, factory production, etc.  Speaking of cars, Germany's diesel engines have been adding illegal pollution as well as CO2 to the air at 50-100 times the rate the law allows.

 

Correct, there are other large producers of CO2 and other exhaust gasses. Steel production is a major one, but transportation is another big one. And Airplane fuel and Ship fuel are not even taxed yet, while they are producing another huge amount of CO2 and other emissions.

Carbon taxation is being implemented in Europe, and it won't be long before others, from outside the EU, will have to pay.

And because the USA imports more than it exports, the consumers will pay for the import taxes (just like they are doing now for Chinese manufactured goods).

Cheers,
Bart

[RSL]

Hi Bart, I know you've probably answered the question already, but I can't find the answer. What's your position on nuclear power?

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

And American consumers would pay the price at the checkout counter.

Exactly. It will become cheaper to reduce emissions, to begin with.

Cheers,
Bart

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Hi Bart, I know you've probably answered the question already, but I can't find the answer. What's your position on nuclear power?

Hi Russ,

I'm in favor, as far as I can now judge, of the next generation of nuclear energy production, Thorium based reactors. They basically burn their own waste, so there is less of a waste management issue. But it will take some 30+ years before that becomes a feasible alternative. We cannot wait for that, and it will be hard to find investors, so it will be slow to add energy to the production pool.

So the solution will be to use multiple sources of clean energy, and transition to them fast to avoid the cost of Global warming.

There is also growing potential for Hydrogen fueled plants, or local generators, and engines for transportation. During the summer, there will soon be more energy produced than can be consumed. That excess can be used to produce Hydrogen gas for storage. The electrolysis 
process is not very efficient, but it's better to use the surplus energy than to let it go to waste.

Cheers,
Bart

[faberryman]

By the way, fab, placing a energy tax on our goods means that your country's consumers are paying higher prices at the counter as well. Did you forget that works both ways?  It's just a tariff by another name.

What do you mean by "your country"?

[Rob C]

What do you own stock in these companies? 

Sure you save some emissions.  But you still need the fossil fuel for backup.  It's not like you can shut them down.  So homeowner have to pay for both the new green energy and pay for upkeep of the existing fossil generators. 

Germany's costs are higher than other European countries, not only the USA.  Most Germans are furious about that.  With all the hot weather you're getting, most Germans don;t have and would not be able to afford air conditioning with the cost of electricity being what it became. CO2 not only comes from the production of electricity.  What about heating, automobiles, factory production, etc.  Speaking of cars, Germany's diesel engines have been adding illegal pollution as well as CO2 to the air at 50-100 times the rate the law allows. 


Regarding taxing on international trade, America has plenty of green energy.  The oil-rich state of Texas has more wind production on it's own than all countries except for five.  America is #2 in the world in green energy.  Hey, we have Tesla cars and Tesla batteries.    In any case, I don;t see how you can place taxes on trade.  If you did, we'd just place a tariff on your goods.  You don; think Trump will let you do that without hitting back, do you?
https://www.power-technology.com/features/wind-energy-by-country/

You're kidding, right?

Germans make the most money in Europe! I wouldn't be at all surprised if they were at the top or very near the top of world earners.  Best economy on the continent. Not sure about Switzerland and Luxembourg in this context, though: they are banking nations, so who knows how they calculate per capitas.

Rob

[RSL]

Hi Russ,

I'm in favor, as far as I can now judge, of the next generation of nuclear energy production, Thorium based reactors. They basically burn their own waste, so there is less of a waste management issue. But it will take some 30+ years before that becomes a feasible alternative. We cannot wait for that, and it will be hard to find investors, so it will be slow to add energy to the production pool.

So the solution will be to use multiple sources of clean energy, and transition to them fast to avoid the cost of Global warming.

There is also growing potential for Hydrogen fueled plants, or local generators, and engines for transportation. During the summer, there will soon be more energy produced than can be consumed. That excess can be used to produce Hydrogen gas for storage. The electrolysis 
process is not very efficient, but it's better to use the surplus energy than to let it go to waste.

Cheers,
Bart

Actually, we don’t have to wait. We already have a straightforward method of recycling spent nuclear fuel into mixed oxide which is usable again in a reactor. The plug in the pipe is political. There’s great fear about nuclear power because of things like Three Mile Island, where no contamination escaped, the Fukushima disaster, caused by an earthquake and tsunami where according to the WHO the amount of radiation exposure to workers in the plant is unlikely to cause problems, and finally Chernobyl, a real catastrophe. The answers to these problems are: (1) build containment structures like the ones at Three Mile Island, (2) don’t build nuclear plants within reach of a tsunami, and (3) don’t let Russians build nuclear  plants.

I’m glad to hear that you’re good with nuclear. I hope we can transition to nuclear power before we’ve killed all the world’s birds with windmills and solar.

[Alan Klein]

The fuel for solar and wind is free. So that part of the energy production changes to only paying for the infrastructure and maintenance, zero for fuel. So, if the building of the renewable energy plans is affordable (and the first ones are currently being built without the need for subsidies, thanks to the learning experiences and falling costs), the plants can be run at competitive costs. This includes the need for fast starting smaller Fossil fuel plants, which are also cheaper than full-scale plants that cannot throttle up/down as fast, and they use less fuel. 

Part of that has to do with the more rapid closing of nuclear energy plants. The losses for the owners of those plants need to be compensated. So there are several factors and one-time transition costs that make a simplistic cost comparison like you made, misleading.
 

Correct, there are other large producers of CO2 and other exhaust gasses. Steel production is a major one, but transportation is another big one. And Airplane fuel and Ship fuel are not even taxed yet, while they are producing another huge amount of CO2 and other emissions.

Carbon taxation is being implemented in Europe, and it won't be long before others, from outside the EU, will have to pay.

And because the USA imports more than it exports, the consumers will pay for the import taxes (just like they are doing now for Chinese manufactured goods).

Cheers,
Bart

  $3200 per household for a million homes in the NYS project is a lot of money to install wind turbines. Those costs don't include overruns which always happens with construction.  It doesn;t include additional lines for the power grid connection.  It doesn;t include the costs to shutdown existing facilities.  It doesn;t include the cost for smaller fossil fuel backup plants or for maintaining the larger existing facilities to backup when there's no wind.  So I'm not misleading.  The green energy community are the ones who are misleading because they never include the true overall cost.  They only quote the cost to build the green plant.  Germany is a perfect example as KWH costs have skyrocketed even though 40% of their electric production is green.  The only thing green is the money they're spending. 

Having said that, I'm all in favor of green energy. I have no axe to grind.  If someone could come up with a design to use water to make energy and power cars, I'd be for it in a heartbeat.  But the public should know what true costs are for green because that's money that might otherwise be spent for cancer research or to feed poor people. 

[Alan Klein]

What do you mean by "your country"?

You responded to an original point I was making to Bart, a Dutchman.   So I thought you were not an American.  Sorry about that. 

It would be helpful though if you added your nationality to your profile.  Our forum is international.  It makes it easier to address and understand people's points if you know where they're from. 

[faberryman]

You responded to an original point I was making to Bart, a Dutchman.   So I thought you were not an American.  Sorry about that.  It would be helpful though if you added your nationality to your profile.  Our forum is international.  It makes it easier to address and understand people's points if you know where they're from.

It's amazing. I disagree with most of Russ's and your points and he thinks I am too young to understand and you think I am a foreigner. I'll refrain from profiling myself; it is much more revealing when you two do it.

[bassman51]

  $3200 per household for a million homes in the NYS project is a lot of money to install wind turbines. Those costs don't include overruns which always happens with construction.  It doesn;t include additional lines for the power grid connection.  It doesn;t include the costs to shutdown existing facilities.  It doesn;t include the cost for smaller fossil fuel backup plants or for maintaining the larger existing facilities to backup when there's no wind.  So I'm not misleading.  The green energy community are the ones who are misleading because they never include the true overall cost.  They only quote the cost to build the green plant.  Germany is a perfect example as KWH costs have skyrocketed even though 40% of their electric production is green.  The only thing green is the money they're spending. 

Having said that, I'm all in favor of green energy. I have no axe to grind.  If someone could come up with a design to use water to make energy and power cars, I'd be for it in a heartbeat.  But the public should know what true costs are for green because that's money that might otherwise be spent for cancer research or to feed poor people.

I think part of the problem about costs is that no one really understands the real cost of either traditional fossil fuels or “Green” energy. 

On the legacy side, the economic costs - at least in the US - are hugely distorted by direct and indirect government subsidies built into the tax code.  However, we have a pretty good idea of the environmental costs, most of which are not reflected in what consumers pay for the energy. 

On the “Green” side, we probably understand the economic costs, because the market is still relatively small and the government distortions are small enough to calculate.  I don’t believe, however, we have a good handle on the environmental costs.  Can anyone predict the cost of disposing of the lithium from tens of millions of car batteries? How about the environmental impact of manufacturing those batteries?  There’s lots of new technology to be deployed, and we can’t understand how it will work out until we have a lot more of it than we have today, and it’s run through it’s useful life.

So how to decide?  I think we need a risk management approach.  As in: what are the risks from taking one or the other course? 

I think the risks from a carbon-fuel based future are clear: continued warming and an environmental disaster which will affect everyone, but disproportionately the poor. 

The main risk from an aggressive renewable energy approach seems to be that it will cost more money in the short run, and probably push off some other beneficial uses of that money, again impacting the poor. The secondary risks are that we may fail to make any impact in global warming and therefore have wasted the money, and/or we may create some other environmental problem we don’t foresee.  But I doubt this track will have the same long-term impact on the world than our current course seems to hold.

[Rob C]

I think part of the problem about costs is that no one really understands the real cost of either traditional fossil fuels or “Green” energy. 

On the legacy side, the economic costs - at least in the US - are hugely distorted by direct and indirect government subsidies built into the tax code.  However, we have a pretty good idea of the environmental costs, most of which are not reflected in what consumers pay for the energy. 

On the “Green” side, we probably understand the economic costs, because the market is still relatively small and the government distortions are small enough to calculate.  I don’t believe, however, we have a good handle on the environmental costs.  Can anyone predict the cost of disposing of the lithium from tens of millions of car batteries? How about the environmental impact of manufacturing those batteries?  There’s lots of new technology to be deployed, and we can’t understand how it will work out until we have a lot more of it than we have today, and it’s run through it’s useful life.

So how to decide?  I think we need a risk management approach.  As in: what are the risks from taking one or the other course? 

I think the risks from a carbon-fuel based future are clear: continued warming and an environmental disaster which will affect everyone, but disproportionately the poor. 

The main risk from an aggressive renewable energy approach seems to be that it will cost more money in the short run, and probably push off some other beneficial uses of that money, again impacting the poor. The secondary risks are that we may fail to make any impact in global warming and therefore have wasted the money, and/or we may create some other environmental problem we don’t foresee.  But I doubt this track will have the same long-term impact on the world than our current course seems to hold.

That's pretty reasonable.

Regarding the cars: I fear that in the long run (no pun etc.) we will be using neither gas nor battery power for cars. I think cars will be off the road except for some official ones that carry VIPs of one kind or another. The problem isn't going to be fueling them but space for them. Cities are already a driving nightmare unless you are just passing through, and yes, dud batteries are going to be one helluva recycling deal. The Mafia could use the opportunity, though.


I mentioned some time ago that a lot of young people who live in cities no longer seek driving licences; I can see their point. They have not grown up with the competitive thing that cars usually become for the young, competitive in the sense if mine is hotter than yours competitive, which grows into the mine cost more than yours did thing. The subway or the bus is all they need or perhaps a taxi at night. Quite how folks in the sticks will get on is something else. Les gilets jaunes had a word or two about that.

Basically, I think our problems arise more from too much unprotected sex than any other factor: we are worse than the steel industries when it comes to overproduction. We make too many copies.

To fix that, though, we have to fight some churches as well as some urges. My wise old mo 'n law used to say that a standing dick had no conscience. I often wondered if she was speaking generally, pointedly or mystically. Always suspected the lady of being slightly fey.

[Alan Klein]

I think part of the problem about costs is that no one really understands the real cost of either traditional fossil fuels or “Green” energy. 

On the legacy side, the economic costs - at least in the US - are hugely distorted by direct and indirect government subsidies built into the tax code.  However, we have a pretty good idea of the environmental costs, most of which are not reflected in what consumers pay for the energy. 

On the “Green” side, we probably understand the economic costs, because the market is still relatively small and the government distortions are small enough to calculate.  I don’t believe, however, we have a good handle on the environmental costs.  Can anyone predict the cost of disposing of the lithium from tens of millions of car batteries? How about the environmental impact of manufacturing those batteries?  There’s lots of new technology to be deployed, and we can’t understand how it will work out until we have a lot more of it than we have today, and it’s run through it’s useful life.

So how to decide?  I think we need a risk management approach.  As in: what are the risks from taking one or the other course? 

I think the risks from a carbon-fuel based future are clear: continued warming and an environmental disaster which will affect everyone, but disproportionately the poor. 

The main risk from an aggressive renewable energy approach seems to be that it will cost more money in the short run, and probably push off some other beneficial uses of that money, again impacting the poor. The secondary risks are that we may fail to make any impact in global warming and therefore have wasted the money, and/or we may create some other environmental problem we don’t foresee.  But I doubt this track will have the same long-term impact on the world than our current course seems to hold.

I agree.  Knowing all the facts is important to making good decisions.  That's what I've been arguing here for two years. Unfortunately, the press and politicians and green industry corporations have not provided both sides - the good as well as the bad.  You'll see that one poor polar bear starving over and over.  But you won;t see nature programs showing the eagles killed by the wind turbines.  They'll tell you about all the energy savings from green.  But you won't see the cost to society in other areas from the shifting of limited resources from cancer research to green energy rebates. 

In order to make smart decisions for the future, the public should have all the data.  Unfortunately, it's been cherry picked.  The public senses that too.  They know when someone has their hand in their pockets.  So a lot of the public refutes the "proof" because it starts looking like a setup.  People know when they're getting hoodwinked.