Free speech and cap 'n trade troubles

[Astronuc]

What I'm saying is that their numbers don't imply viability for even much shorter timeframes. This is admittedly speculative, but if the storage is spread out evenly around the world and all of it is accessible, the numbers for the US look like this . . . .

I wasn't even discussing viability of the whole concept, but only the fact that there exists technology to capture and store CO2. Whether or not it is necessary to do so is a rather contentious subject.

It appears there are several small scale demonstration projects underway, with larger ones coming online in the next few years. It's a matter of economics - one starts small with low capital cost with the objective that the technology achieves what is expected, then scales up to larger systems. If the technology fails, then it's not applied on the larger scale.


If CCS is satisfactorily demonstrated, then I believe the plan is to use existing pipeline networks as much as possible. Otherwise, the plan is to storage captured CO2 in reservoirs under the plant where it is produced or within the vicinity.

 

[mheslep]

Why, don't Texas and Alaska have any local CO2 to sequester? Does the CO2 sequestered need to be the exact same CO2 molecules that are emitted from power plants?

It can be done, but pulling CO2 out the atmosphere generally is much more energy intensive that grabbing it immediately as a product of coal combustion.

 

[Al68]

It can be done, but pulling CO2 out the atmosphere generally is much more energy intensive that grabbing it immediately as a product of coal combustion.

Sure, but I wasn't comparing pulling it out of the air to grabbing it at the source. I was comparing pulling it out of the air to shipping or piping it around the world.

 

[Astronuc]

Sure, but I wasn't comparing pulling it out of the air to grabbing it at the source. I was comparing pulling it out of the air to shipping or piping it around the world.

Right now, carbon capture technology is focused capturing at the source, and piping it somewhere, locally or wherever, into an underground reservoir. In some cases, it could be pumped into oil or gas reservoirs to enhance production. In other cases it pure storage.

At 350 or 390 or 400 ppm, it would be rather expensive to capture CO2 from the air using a mechanical or industrial process. On the other hand, it seems the idea is to use plants or algae to capture CO2 from the air, since plants do it so well naturally.

There are programs looking at the effects of deforestation on climate, as well as programs to reforest areas in temperate and tropical regions.

 

[skypunter]

Indeed, the US now has the largest unproven gas reserves in the world due to the shale gas, some 1750 TCF. Even so, that's only 75 years of gas at today's US usage rates.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/164713-how-much-natural-gas-remains-in-the-usa

Proven is defined as reserves which are economical at todays price. Unproven reserves are discovered but not deemed economical at todays price. Our proven reserves estimate moves with the price of the commodity.

Bring the price up to a still reasonable $4.00 per mcf and the new unconventional reserves become proven reserves with a greater than 100 year known supply. These unconventional discoveries are a big part of the reason natural gas is so cheap now.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oil_gas/natural_gas/data_publications/crude_oil_natural_gas_reserves/cr.html

Natural Gas requires minimal refining, and at $4.00 per mcf it would be cheaper than gasoline as a transportation fuel. Heavy haulers such as railroads and trucks which burn over 50% of transportation fuels are the easiest to convert to natural gas because they can carry the larger storage tanks required to travel acceptable distances. Natural gas hybrid autos would be next in line, having far greater range between fueling than an all electric. If we can come up with a more efficient gas liqufication process, then natural gas automobiles would attain greater range than gasoline powered vehicles of today. This is a realistic possibility.

If and when alternatives become cheaper than hydrocarbons, then they will be a more efficient use of our resources and we will turn to them.

Cap and trade attempts to artificially make hydrocarbons more expensive, through taxes, in order to make alternatives appear more affordable. That is money out of our pockets.

Where does this additional tax revenue go? We are promised many things, including support for alternative technology, lowering payroll taxes, or whatever else they think the masses will lap up.

When we legalized casinos in many states, the additional revenue was supposed to go to education...

The above does not even address the issue of creating a worldwide taxing authority (the UN), which is the equivalent of surrendering national sovereignty. Those who died for our independence are surely turning in their graves.

 

[Chalnoth]

Cap and trade attempts to artificially make hydrocarbons more expensive, through taxes, in order to make alternatives appear more affordable. That is money out of our pockets.

This is basically a lie. Cap and trade doesn't provide an extra tax. What it does instead is artificially limits production of carbon-producing fuels. Instead of a tax, there's a distribution of resources towards fuels/energy sources which are more carbon-neutral, just because people aren't allowed to buy as many carbon-producing fuels. This redistribution of resources is automatic, and driven by the market economy: those alternative fuels which are most cost effective will get the most resources under a pure cap-and-trade system.

Of course, this does have the effect of increasing prices somewhat, but it isn't a tax. The increase in prices comes from the increased resources required to extract energy from renewable sources. Basically, with a decent cap and trade system, the market economy automatically funnels the extra money into effective or promising (to investors) alternative energy sources. Because it isn't a tax, we don't need to worry about some bureaucrat in Washington deciding where the money goes. All that we do have to worry about is that there aren't nasty loopholes that allow extra emission of carbon. The market takes care of the rest.

 

[mheslep]

This is basically a lie. Cap and trade doesn't provide an extra tax.

tax
  /tæks/
–noun
1. a sum of money demanded by a government for its support or for specific facilities or services, levied upon incomes, property, sales, etc.
2. a burdensome charge, obligation, duty, or demand.

Whatever the end effect of Cap and Trade, it exactly meets this definition. Whether or not the government subsequently allows redistribution of the collected revenue under a rule set to other individuals or businesses changes the definition of tax not at all. There are certainly different kinds of taxes; the best one can say here is that this tax different in application from, say, the income tax.

Furthermore, the effect of this bill as scored by http://energycommerce.house.gov/Press_111/20090626/hr2454_cbo20090626.pdf" for this particular bill is an increase in government revenue via carbon levies of $873 billion over ten years; roughly that same amount is then spent by the government under the bill (i.e. 'bureaucrats' as you mentioned) on other energy related topics such as energy efficiency technology R&D, renewable energy, carbon capture and sequestration, electric vehicle tech, etc, etc.

You should modify your opening statement.

What it does instead is artificially limits production of carbon-producing fuels.

ALL taxes tend to restrain trade in the area to which they are applied.

Instead of a tax, there's a distribution of resources towards fuels/energy sources which are more carbon-neutral,

That is what is hoped, it's not a fact of the proposed law

just because people aren't allowed to buy as many carbon-producing fuels.

No, there's no default quota placed on 'people' re how much they can buy; there's an intended increase in the price of carbon emissions. BTW, the bill may simply move emissions elsewhere ( e.g. China).

The increase in prices comes from the increased resources required to extract energy from renewable sources.

Secondary effect. In the first instance, the government demands the price increase, i.e, a tax.

 

[Chalnoth]

Whatever the end effect of Cap and Trade, it exactly meets this definition. Whether or not the government subsequently allows redistribution of the collected revenue under a rule set to other individuals or businesses changes the definition of tax not at all. There are certainly different kinds of taxes; the best one can say here is that this tax different in application from, say, the income tax.

It doesn't allow it. It simply happens: the government doesn't see any of any extra money paid at all. There is no revenue collected at all with pure cap-and-trade.

Furthermore, the effect of this bill as scored by http://energycommerce.house.gov/Press_111/20090626/hr2454_cbo20090626.pdf" for this particular bill is an increase in government revenue via carbon levies of $873 billion over ten years; roughly that same amount is then spent by the government under the bill (i.e. 'bureaucrats' as you mentioned) on other energy related topics such as energy efficiency technology R&D, renewable energy, carbon capture and sequestration, electric vehicle tech, etc, etc.

That may be an impact on the entire bill, but it's not an effect of cap and trade in and of itself. Carbon levies are, obviously, taxes. And they're not such a bad thing either, though cap and trade is perhaps better.

BTW, the bill may simply move emissions elsewhere ( e.g. China).

This is why for any cap and trade system to be effective, it needs to be supplanted with tariffs on imports from countries that don't have similar systems.

 

[Astronuc]

fee = tax?

I sat in on a meeting with some financial people who were apparently planning to make millions or billions off Cap n' Trade.

Duke Energy has been concerned about fair pricing for their offsets.

 

[mheslep]

fee = tax?

I sat in on a meeting with some financial people who were apparently planning to make millions or billions off Cap n' Trade.

Duke Energy has been concerned about fair pricing for their offsets.

Offsets are the downfall of Cap n' Trade. In my view there's no stopping massive gaming of the offsets, which is why I favor the straightforward carbon tax* strongly supported by many (most?) economists.

*With a return of the revenue through general tax cuts or rebates.

 

[Chalnoth]

Offsets are the downfall of Cap n' Trade. In my view there's no stopping massive gaming of the offsets, which is why I favor the straightforward carbon tax* strongly supported by many (most?) economists.

I'm not so sure it's strongly supported by most economists.

But yes, a lot of people stand to make a lot of money out of cap and trade, through one of two means:
1. Political maneuvering to get more "carbon credits" than they should get.
2. Having the ability to drastically cut carbon emissions quickly, thus allowing them to sell their carbon credits.

Point (1) is obviously a problem that needs to be dealt with strongly for cap and trade to be effective. Point (2) is very desirable, and the entire purpose of cap and trade in the first place.

 

[russ_watters]

Offsets are the downfall of Cap n' Trade. In my view there's no stopping massive gaming of the offsets, which is why I favor the straightforward carbon tax* strongly supported by many (most?) economists.

Follow-up question: who cares what economists think? Are economists environmental scientists and mechanical and chemical engineers?

The problem isn't the economic models per se. The problem is the view of reality input into the models isn't based on real science/engineering. Economists don't know that pollution reduction vs cost isn't a continuous function because they don't understand what it actually takes to reduce pollution.

Ie, in the case of CO2, you can't say that money/current pollution = new pollution

Back when "pollution" referred to abnormal combustion products such as nitrous and sulfur oxides, it was theoretically possible (and was done) to reduce them in a hyperbolic function of cost along a very wide range of pollution levels. The reason is, the solutions were designed to improve, not replace, existing energy production methods. You can take a coal plant and reduce the NO2 by a factor of 10 if you want and it is just a question of money. But CO2 isn't like that. No amount of new technology is going to reduce the CO2 output of coal power plants by more than about 20% (the difference between current efficiency and the theoretical maximum). Only by discarding coal altogether can we get rid of its CO2 production. So by slowly cranking down on the cap, you can, in the short term, get your cap and trade to follow a continuous function, but in a little bit of time, you'll hit a wall where you can't go any further without abandoning the coal plant (or finding a way to destroy or store CO2 itself). And if that's the way it has to go, you've wasted time and money on a partial solution that is of little help in working towards the full solution.

 

[Chalnoth]

I think that's sort of the point of cap and trade: to provide incentives to gradually replace fossil fuel technologies.

 

[skypunter]

I think that's sort of the point of cap and trade: to provide incentives to gradually replace fossil fuel technologies.

With what?
It feels like we're being herded toward a cliff, while the "shepherd" promises that we can fly!

 

[Proton Soup]

Isn't this like the Nasa employees that were 'silenced' for mentioning evolution or global warming?

Your employment contract (especially with a federal agency) says you can't make public pronouncements about your work without clearing them with the press office.
So to drum up some publicity you claim to have been silenced by The Man.

i do wonder how that would collide with laws passed to protect whistleblowers.

 

[skypunter]

Nasa's director was censured for expressing doubts about the IPCC prophecies.
http://www.ewire.com/display.cfm/Wire_ID/3967
And isn't this interesting...
Hansen hopes summit will fail!
http://www.upi.com/Science_News/200...-warming-summit-will-fail/UPI-47481259868717/

 

[russ_watters]

I think that's sort of the point of cap and trade: to provide incentives to gradually replace fossil fuel technologies.

That's the goal of people who support CO2 reduction, but cap and trade isn't capable of doing that because you can't "gradually replace" a power plant, nor can you gradually invent a new technology (such as carbon capture).

This is part of the reason we don't see more nuclear plants being built now. The return on investment is on the order of 30 years because it takes a long time to build them and they are expensive. But once up and running, they are cheap to operate. So you have to be willing to accept a 30 year ROI on the construction of the plant. But ask any business what kind of ROI they'll accept on an energy reduction project and you'll get answers on the order of 5-10 years.

Economics is simply not equipped to handle this issue, so as said above, we're getting hearded towards a cliff. And that's with or without global warming: our nuclear plants are aging and we aren't building new ones, while at the same time our capacity margins are getting thinner. We're going to run into major electrical grid reliability problems because of this.

 

[Chalnoth]

With what?
It feels like we're being herded toward a cliff, while the "shepherd" promises that we can fly!

A wide variety of technologies. Fossil fuels are obviously too useful for anyone single renewable energy source to replace them.

Nuclear is obviously one solution. Others are wind and solar, but those require significant improvements in the electrical grid. Conservation is another solution, as there is one heck of a lot of wasted energy out there. We also have biofuels (esp. algal biofuels) as an alternative for fuel for transportation.

All of these solutions come with their problems, but the complaint that they're 'too difficult' or 'too expensive' completely misses the point: they're necessary. If we don't switch off of fossil fuels at some point, modern civilization ends. The specter of global warming merely forces us to switch off of fossil fuels a bit sooner than we otherwise might, or else face dire economic and humanitarian consequences.

The nice thing about initiatives like cap and trade is that they automatically divert resources into effective or promising alternative fuels (and even ways of conserving energy), using the market to ensure that those resources are divided as efficiently as possible. And they do it in a way that scales with the difficulty of the problem of generating energy from alternative sources.

 

[mheslep]

Follow-up question: who cares what economists think? Are economists environmental scientists and mechanical and chemical engineers?

The problem isn't the economic models per se. The problem is the view of reality input into the models isn't based on real science/engineering. Economists don't know that pollution reduction vs cost isn't a continuous function because they don't understand what it actually takes to reduce pollution.

Ie, in the case of CO2, you can't say that money/current pollution = new pollution

Back when "pollution" referred to abnormal combustion products such as nitrous and sulfur oxides, it was theoretically possible (and was done) to reduce them in a hyperbolic function of cost along a very wide range of pollution levels. The reason is, the solutions were designed to improve, not replace, existing energy production methods. You can take a coal plant and reduce the NO2 by a factor of 10 if you want and it is just a question of money. But CO2 isn't like that. No amount of new technology is going to reduce the CO2 output of coal power plants by more than about 20% (the difference between current efficiency and the theoretical maximum). Only by discarding coal altogether can we get rid of its CO2 production.

Edit: I think you are on point here with a major problem surrounding the application of cap and trade to CO2, but imprecise. I agree completely that reducing real toxics like SO2 was just a question of money, and it was understood almost exactly how much money so the value of those improvements could be traded. Here's the difference with CO2: I assert removing it from, say, coal plants is also just a question of money, and time. I could set up a rig in my basement to capture CO2 from a combusted a lump of coal. However, the problem is we do not know how much money sequestering CO2 at scale costs. Is my geology suitable for storage? Don't know. Got to do some test drilling. If I can't store CO2 here, got to pipe it. What's the cost of the right of way for ~100 miles of pipe? Don't know. What's the cost of a certified CO2 separation rig at 1GW scale? Well there have been several pilot plants, but nothing certified so I really don't know that cost either. The point is without knowing the cost, I can't trade the value to someone else. Now, economists well understand this kind of limitation of uncertainty of costs, even if they don't know a dam thing about drilling and CO2 separations.

So by slowly cranking down on the cap, you can, in the short term, get your cap and trade to follow a continuous function, but in a little bit of time, you'll hit a wall where you can't go any further without abandoning the coal plant (or finding a way to destroy or store CO2 itself). And if that's the way it has to go, you've wasted time and money on a partial solution that is of little help in working towards the full solution.

The problem is externalities. Engineers in this context are in business of optimizing designs given input/output costs to their system. They don't evaluate the cost to the nation based on the security issues surrounding imported oil, nor mostly do thet care about carbon emissions (I'm skeptical on CO2 in the short run). They don't care because there is no cost to either imports or CO2 on their balance sheets. If these external problems are to be considered in the overall design of energy plants and systems, someone has to put a price on them that then shows up on the engineers tally. That's where economists come in. The best way to do this, IMO, is not via caps, it's via a rebated carbon tax.

 

[mheslep]

That's the goal of people who support CO2 reduction, but cap and trade isn't capable of doing that because you can't "gradually replace" a power plant, nor can you gradually invent a new technology (such as carbon capture).

This is part of the reason we don't see more nuclear plants being built now.[...]

I don't follow this last part - what does long term around times in nuclear have to do with proposed cap and trade, which is not in effect yet?

Economics is simply not equipped to handle this issue,

I share concerns about the results of bad policy and economics, but not that economics is not relevant. Economics is about understanding the effects of supply, demand, and prices. Of course it's relevant to energy, and anything else that can have a price put on it.

 

[Chalnoth]

The best way to do this, IMO, is not via caps, it's via a rebated carbon tax.

Well, the nice thing about cap-and-trade is that the money is automatically redistributed to more efficient (in terms of CO2 output) energy sources. With a carbon tax, you not only have to rely upon the government to do a good job applying the tax, but also in redistributing it.

Basically, the effect on carbon production is the same either way. But with cap-and-trade, because the market is allowed to take care of redistribution, redistribution of funds is made optimally cost-effective.

 

[skypunter]

Lots of uneasy jockeying for position happening around Copenhaagendazs.
Gore backs out.
Obama reschedules.
Maybe Gore is the wiser of the two.
The future is, as always, uncertain.

 

[russ_watters]

Edit: I think you are on point here with a major problem surrounding the application of cap and trade to CO2, but imprecise. I agree completely that reducing real toxics like SO2 was just a question of money, and it was understood almost exactly how much money so the value of those improvements could be traded. Here's the difference with CO2: I assert removing it from, say, coal plants is also just a question of money, and time. I could set up a rig in my basement to capture CO2 from a combusted a lump of coal. However, the problem is we do not know how much money sequestering CO2 at scale costs.

I almost agree. While I'm sure the concept can be demonstrated on a science fair scale, I'm not convinced the viability has been studied in detail (much less even theoretically described) on a national, industrial scale. The difficulty isn't in the capture, it is in the disposal.

Astronuc provided some of the best articles I've seen about the subject, but even they just discuss the issue roughly. What is needed is a 1000 page government study of the true national scale viability. It would look like this:

Take the biggest 500 coal plants and analyze the technical and economic viability of carbon capture/sequestration for each of them and all of them as a group. The study would need to figure out:
-What is the quantity of CO2?
-What would the retrofit cost?
-Does the plant have the remaining lifespan necessary for that to be worth it?
-Where can you put the CO2?
-How do you get it there?
-Does the geographic layout of plants lend itself to a pipeline?
-How much would that cost?
-How much storage capacity does that location have?
-What are the risks of failure in the storage location?

Now the end result of such a study might be that it appears technically viable to store all of our emissions for 10 years (or half for 20 or 1/5 for 50, etc.) - and that would still be worth doing if the economics look reasonable. Either way, the study would have answers to the questions of technical and economic viability. But then moving toward implimentation, you need a nationalized strategy to properly implement it. Pipelines, in particular are not something you can do without government involvement.

And what happens if the study finds it is only technically viable to store 10% of our emissions for 10 years at a cost of $20 billion per 1000 MW? Then the idea would have to be abandoned as a viable national energy strategy.

One thing I envy about France - 40 years ago, they put together a national energy strategy and they just did it! In the US, we've been talking about the downsides of fossil fuels since at least the mid-70s and have made essentially zero progress in moving away from it.

The problem is externalities. Engineers in this context are in business of optimizing designs given input/output costs to their system. They don't evaluate the cost to the nation based on the security issues surrounding imported oil, nor mostly do thet care about carbon emissions (I'm skeptical on CO2 in the short run).

That's an oil issue and I'm mostly just talking about coal here. But you're right, there is just no reason for an engineer or financial advisor to care about what the government spends on an issue when he's being paid by a power company to make a strategy work for them.

 

[russ_watters]

I don't follow this last part - what does long term around times in nuclear have to do with proposed cap and trade, which is not in effect yet?

The same problem exists for nuclear power, whether cap and trade is an issue or not. Whether calculating the impact of cap and trade or just doing the normal business of projecting whether your power company needs to build a new plant to handle new demand or replace an existing plant, the problem is the same: people are short-sighted.

I share concerns about the results of bad policy and economics, but not that economics is not relevant. Economics is about understanding the effects of supply, demand, and prices. Of course it's relevant to energy, and anything else that can have a price put on it.

Obviously, any solution has economic implications that need to be considered. I didn't say that economics is not relevant, I said economics is not equipped to handle this issue. By that I mean that you cannot use economics as the driver of the issue. Cap and trade is an attempt to use economics (without even really analyzing the economics!) to drive a problem that is technical in nature.

And the thing that irritates me most about it is that it doesn't seem to even attempt to address either the economic or technical viability of the solutions. You just crank down on the cap and let the power companies deal with all that. How much does carbon sequestration cost? Meh, not my problem - just crank down on the cap and they'll figure it out!

 

[skypunter]

That's the goal of people who support CO2 reduction, but cap and trade isn't capable of doing that because you can't "gradually replace" a power plant, nor can you gradually invent a new technology (such as carbon capture).

This is part of the reason we don't see more nuclear plants being built now. The return on investment is on the order of 30 years because it takes a long time to build them and they are expensive. But once up and running, they are cheap to operate. So you have to be willing to accept a 30 year ROI on the construction of the plant. But ask any business what kind of ROI they'll accept on an energy reduction project and you'll get answers on the order of 5-10 years.

Economics is simply not equipped to handle this issue, so as said above, we're getting hearded towards a cliff. And that's with or without global warming: our nuclear plants are aging and we aren't building new ones, while at the same time our capacity margins are getting thinner. We're going to run into major electrical grid reliability problems because of this.

Russ is right.
France's nuclear program is a great example of a social program which works. We could do this too, the technology is known.
Once again, environmental extremists have a ball and chain around our ankles.

 

[mheslep]

One thing I envy about France - 40 years ago, they put together a national energy strategy and they just did it! ...

First, France has no oil at all so they really felt the embargo in the 70's, second they're half a police state to my mind and forced the issue. I don't care to emulate that.

 

[russ_watters]

First, France has no oil at all so they really felt the embargo in the 70's, second they're half a police state to my mind and forced the issue. I don't care to emulate that.

In general, I don't care to emulate France either, but this is one of very few issues that requires a government orchestrated strategy.

 

[Argentum Vulpes]

That's the goal of people who support CO2 reduction, but cap and trade isn't capable of doing that because you can't "gradually replace" a power plant, nor can you gradually invent a new technology (such as carbon capture).

This is part of the reason we don't see more nuclear plants being built now. The return on investment is on the order of 30 years because it takes a long time to build them and they are expensive. But once up and running, they are cheap to operate. So you have to be willing to accept a 30 year ROI on the construction of the plant. But ask any business what kind of ROI they'll accept on an energy reduction project and you'll get answers on the order of 5-10 years.

Economics is simply not equipped to handle this issue, so as said above, we're getting hearded towards a cliff. And that's with or without global warming: our nuclear plants are aging and we aren't building new ones, while at the same time our capacity margins are getting thinner. We're going to run into major electrical grid reliability problems because of this.

I'd like to add a bit to the reason we aren't seeing any new construction of nuclear plants in the US. In a word regulations. If you want to build a nuclear plant to replace say a coal, LNG, hydro plant, ect. and the electrical grid is a nuclear virgin system the plant builder is responsible for the upgrading of the grid. Tax breaks and loan grantees form the fed are almost imposable to get. Finally anyone with a lawyer can file an injunction against the plant owners and stall building for a long time. 20 years to build something in a civilian setting is completely ridiculous. The US navy can have a perfectly safe reactor put together and running in about four years. China recently put a civilian reactor from ground breaking to running in about 5 years as well. Anyone else see a problem here.

Just for a small comparison. A 150 MW wind farm in MT was up and running in 1 year and with tax credits the investors made back there initial investment when the first kW went down the line. Also the state covered the upgrading to the electrical grid.

Another reason there have been several big wind projects in MT is not because of the wind but because of all the slack electrical generation capacity that is available. Current electrical grids are built on the need to have a constant available amount of power in the system. So renewables like solar and wind are problematic when they are not generating power, some other source must be putting power into the grid, or it crashes.

So basically nuclear is the future for power production in the US. It would solve so many problem like CO2 production for electricity. New gen 4 reactors can also produce hydrogen gas from waste heat, giving the hydrogen economy a cheep CO2 free start. Provide cheep electricity, and provide the most jobs per kWh compared to any other power production industry.

We don't need cap and trade (AKA cap and tax/pollution indulgences), we need nuclear power.

 

[skypunter]

What is more practical, reprocessing fuel and then storing the resultant low grade waste or attempting to store enough CO2 to regulate global climate?
I know what I think, but would like to hear the reasoning of those who are opposed to nuclear.

 

[skypunter]

In general, I don't care to emulate France either, but this is one of very few issues that requires a government orchestrated strategy.

IMHO government should be limited to basic infrastructure, such as roads, law enforcement and defense.
It does appear that energy is becoming a necessary component of the infrastructure, vital to our national interest. Energy has almost become "the coin of the realm" for modern civilization.
In the case of nuclear energy, since strict security concerns are also involved, an exception to the "infrastructure only" limitation may be applicable.
Nuclear energy would surely pay for itself and so would not be a long term burden on the taxpayers.
Domestic hydrocarbons, particularly natural gas, would continue to be competitive.
The benefit of this mix would be that we would not have all of our eggs in one basket.
The largest uranium reserves are presently in Australia, but the US has substantial domestic reserves.
http://www.euronuclear.org/info/encyclopedia/u/uranium-reserves.htm
http://www.worldenergy.org/publications/survey_of_energy_resources_interim_update_2009/part_i_uranium/1808.asp
Notably, the largest uranium reserves lie beneath free nations. That's refreshing.

 

[Chalnoth]

I'd like to add a bit to the reason we aren't seeing any new construction of nuclear plants in the US. In a word regulations.

I believe the primary problem is local opposition. Most communities don't want a nuclear plant anywhere nearby, and it's very very easy to whip up some opposition with just a little reminder to the three mile island incident.

We don't need cap and trade (AKA cap and tax/pollution indulgences), we need nuclear power.

Cap and trade would, however, automatically make nuclear power more appealing to the market. As well as other sources.

I do find it interesting, though, that the biggest argument you can levy against cap and trade is to attempt to attach a nasty descriptor to it.

 

[saltine]

Hi,

Are Cap N' Trade, Carbon Tax, and Carbon Divident the three main choices?

What would happen if the government regulates how much an energy company can charge their customers based on its emission? It if emits too much carbon, its revenue would be lower than its operation cost. At that point it would have to close itself. This way doesn't create any middleman and the public is not paying more

 

[Chalnoth]

Hi,

Are Cap N' Trade, Carbon Tax, and Carbon Divident the three main choices?

What would happen if the government regulates how much an energy company can charge their customers based on its emission? It if emits too much carbon, its revenue would be lower than its operation cost. At that point it would have to close itself. This way doesn't create any middleman and the public is not paying more

Well, it seems to me that that would be more prone to exploitation than a cap-and-trade system, largely because energy costs vary significantly from place to place.

 

[Argentum Vulpes]

I believe the primary problem is local opposition. Most communities don't want a nuclear plant anywhere nearby, and it's very very easy to whip up some opposition with just a little reminder to the three mile island incident.


Cap and trade would, however, automatically make nuclear power more appealing to the market. As well as other sources.

I do find it interesting, though, that the biggest argument you can levy against cap and trade is to attempt to attach a nasty descriptor to it.

Yes people having only consumed anti nuclear propaganda from the coal industry is a problem. Being ill informed and only having a knee jerk reaction to something is a problem. However you seemed to have glossed over my point of the responsibility of a nuclear power plant being responsible for grid upgrades, when no other power production type/industry has the same obligations. If you ever need to read something and you are done with War and Peace or the health care bill of 09 go look up the entire body of work for building/licensing/running a nuclear plant. You will be reading for a very long time. Again no other industry is as heavily regulated. Most refineries and chemical production plants handle stuff that will kill you as quick as spent fuel at the end of its time in a reactor, but have less regulations, and oversight.

For these other sources what are they? LNG is a fossil fuel so a CO2 emitter, Bio-diesel needs either methanol (a fossil fuel), or ethanol (all of its problems), Solar doesn't produce when the sun is hiding leading to grid stability problems, Wind is only strong and reliable enough in a small percentage of the country, tidal will only help the coastal regions, and Hydro is either built in all of the places that will support a dam, or dams are being removed for environmental reasons. Plus having a centralized power system is incredibly costly, and dangerous for the linemen that must maintain the HT transmission lines.

As for calling cap and trade by cap and tax or pollution indulgences is incredibly accurate. For example as a coal burring plant that emit over the cap of CO2 (BTW according to the EPA as of 12/7/09 is a pollutant) can go out and buy CO2 credits to offset there over emittance of CO2, there buy avoiding fines. Sounds like a textbook example of an indulgence concerning pollution. As for calling it cap and tax, how long do you thing it will take the federal government to start taxing the brand new shiny commodity out on the market? Anything legally traded on the open market is taxed by dear old Uncle Sam. As for the argument good let's stick to the evil rich cooperations with new taxes, do you honestly think that they pay any taxes? No it gets passed on to the consumer in the form of a more expensive product.

If congress and the Obma administration is really serious about getting CO2 production down they will repeal the reprocessing ban put into place by Carter, take the unnecessary regulations off of nuclear plant owners, make loan grantees easier to get, fix the tax code/breaks to be the same across the board for all energy production, limit lawsuits against nuclear power plan building/fueling/operation, and just not hear the frivolous lawsuits meant to delay everything associated with the plant and bankrupt the owners/investors. Not put forth pie in the sky pointless legislation.

 

[Chalnoth]

As for calling cap and trade by cap and tax or pollution indulgences is incredibly accurate.

How? How is it possibly accurate? Indulgences were an invention of the Catholic church for full or partial remission of sins for a person (alive or dead) for a sum of money. They were, in short, a confidence scheme promising an imaginary reward for cash (rather similar to today's "prosperity theology").

Cap and trade, by contrast, is a means to provide an economic cost for CO2 production, in order to leverage the power of the market to help reduce it.

I don't see how they're remotely similar, even by analogy.

As for the argument good let's stick to the evil rich cooperations with new taxes, do you honestly think that they pay any taxes? No it gets passed on to the consumer in the form of a more expensive product.

Yes, thereby making their goods less competitive on the market, thereby costing the company money.

If congress and the Obma administration is really serious about getting CO2 production down they will repeal the reprocessing ban put into place by Carter, take the unnecessary regulations off of nuclear plant owners, make loan grantees easier to get, fix the tax code/breaks to be the same across the board for all energy production, limit lawsuits against nuclear power plan building/fueling/operation, and just not hear the frivolous lawsuits meant to delay everything associated with the plant and bankrupt the owners/investors. Not put forth pie in the sky pointless legislation.

Some of those things may help, but I wouldn't be entirely for completely relaxing regulation on nuclear power plants. They do have the capacity to cause far more damage to the area surrounding the plant, if poorly build and/or maintained, and we do need to be certain that all nuclear waste is accounted for and properly managed. Perhaps some of the regulations go too far, but I would prefer if we were careful about deregulation.