Federal government approves second SolarReserve solar power plant

[RandomGuy]

I agree, RG should feel honored that I hold his patience so highly.

Even that has it's limits. Talking to Yonivore about wider politics takes on the near-fruitlessness of talking to conspiracy theorists about their pet theories.

To Yoni's credit, he is both more erudite, and very occasionally, will own up to some of this turds.

I do give him some marginal credit for being more sane than Cosmored and company. He is still a slave to his confirmation biases, but at least he isn't bat insane.

[RandomGuy]

You're right, it was a bit simplistic. Their social programs are doing are doing their share of the damage.

Bull .

If the US had the demographics of Europe, we would be just as ed.

All those illegal aliens and their kids are the only thing seperating us from economic stagnation of an rapidly aging population, ala Japan.

The fact that our safety net is so thin will be laid pretty bare in the parade of elder-care horror stories we are going to be witness to in the coming years.

You extreme rightists are getting your wish about gutting social safetey nets and public spending on things like public education.

I will be right there to rub your nose in that pile of dog turd policies.

Unless you have a free-market solution for tens of millions of impoverished elderly?

Speak up, I would love to hear it.

[Wild Cobra]

Presumption is a wonderful thing, maestro. Everyone else has to show their work while you just wait for your train to arrive, ignoring everything else.

I will rely on my life experience for this. Like I said, just wait and see. If these policies do actually take effect, reducing that much clean capacity, prices will take a notable jump.

[Wild Cobra]

Solar and Wind Could Power the West Right Now, All of America in 2026

The Germans have installed over 10,000 megawatts of solar panels in the past two years, enough to power 2 million American homes (or most of Los Angeles, CA). If Americans installed local solar at the same torrid pace, we could already power most of the Mountain West, could have a 100 percent solar nation by 2026, while enriching thousands of local communities with new development and jobs.

The following map shows what could have happened had the U.S. kept pace with Germany on solar power in the past two years (installed the same megawatts on a per capita basis). Sunshine could power 10 states!

http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/1...-west-america/

At the same, Feds should make DirtyBigCoal and PollutingFrackers pay for ALL of the cost externalities, rather than leaving the taxpayers with the costs of destroyed surface water, ground water, levelled mountains, defaced landscapes. Ain't gonna happen, the Repugs will block any such legislation to protect and enrich UCA.

Do you know how much more electricity already costs in Germany? It isn't a price leap for them, like it would be for us. It's 0.2671 Euros/kWh. Now convert Euros to dollars and you get over $0.36/kWh.

link

[boutons_deux]

"prices will take a notable jump"

yes, USA was built on cheap energy, from oil and from coal. So America has never grown up, been responsible, and paid its way while sucking down and mostly wasting 25% of the world's oil.

Europeans bit the bullet on imported oil and taxed it high enough to force down consumption, thereby keeping their more of their wealth at home, rather than in oil countries.

Becasue BigOil and BigCoal write the national energy policy to maximize their profits, Human-Americans get ed and sucked dry of their wealth, while getting stuck with all the external costs of oil and coal, a huge failure of "market" solutions.

[Wild Cobra]

"prices will take a notable jump"

yes, USA was built on cheap energy, from oil and from coal. So America has never grown up, been responsible, and paid its way while sucking down and mostly wasting 25% of the world's oil.

Europeans bit the bullet on imported oil and taxed it high enough to force down consumption, thereby keeping their more of their wealth at home, rather than in oil countries.

Becasue BigOil and BigCoal write the national energy policy to maximize their profits, Human-Americans get ed and sucked dry of their wealth, while getting stuck with all the external costs of oil and coal, a huge failure of "market" solutions.

I see...

You are an advocate of paying $0.40 per kWh. OK...

[boutons_deux]

I see, you are an advocate of shipping $500B/year to overseas oil producers.

I see, you are an advocate of mountain top removal, the pollution of land and water with methyl mercury, cadium, lead from unscrubbed coal-fired plants, and of coal ash polluting land and water.

[Wild Cobra]

I see, you are an advocate of shipping $500B/year to overseas oil producers.

I see, you are an advocate of mountain top removal, the pollution of land and water with methyl mercury, cadium, lead from unscrubbed coal-fired plants, and of coal ash polluting land and water.

To completely live clean, we would have to turn into Amish. If you are one not to tolerate any side effects, then why do you use electricity?

[admiralsnackbar]

To completely live clean, we would have to turn into Amish. If you are one not to tolerate any side effects, then why do you use electricity?

That's like saying I should pick a lane : abstinence or alcoholism. There's a fairly wide territory that unfolds between those options, wouldn't you say?

[boutons_deux]

WC's America is the America of No-Can-Do, Sir! We (99%) Are Broke, etc.

[Wild Cobra]

That's like saying I should pick a lane : abstinence or alcoholism. There's a fairly wide territory that unfolds between those options, wouldn't you say?

But that's effectively what he is saying. I am only using another example to bring that to light.

[Wild Cobra]

WC's America is the America of No-Can-Do, Sir! We (99%) Are Broke, etc.

Quite the contrary. I know we can do, and unlike the Flea Party, I want less government interference.

[boutons_deux]

"we can do"

Wall St won't finance the conversion of coal plants to cleanliness because the govt regs don't force it. Big Coal buys the absence of the coal regs, externalizing the costs pollution to everybody else. A perfect example of market failure and why gov intervention is needed. UCA/capitalists will pollute, destroy any air, land, water, employees if there's enough money in it.

[Wild Cobra]

"we can do"

Wall St won't finance the conversion of coal plants to cleanliness because the govt regs don't force it. Big Coal buys the absence of the coal regs, externalizing the costs pollution to everybody else. A perfect example of market failure and why gov intervention is needed. UCA/capitalists will pollute, destroy any air, land, water, employees if there's enough money in it.

I'm sure you have dozens of links showing internal memos that prove such allegations, right?

[boutons_deux]

"Do Your Own Research" -- WC

[Wild Cobra]

"Do Your Own Research" -- WC

I have. I came up empty.

[MannyIsGod]

Solar, baby.

In comparison, the U.S. spends roughly $1 billion a day importing oil. Diverting 10 percent of that money to supporting the solar industry would instantly put the U.S. ahead of China in terms of industrial support. "To walk away from what is one of the most promising areas of the future is insane," van Mierlo argues. "We have to compete. It would be profoundly un-American not to compete."


http://www.scientificamerican.com/ar...r-power&page=1

Great article

[DarrinS]

In comparison, the U.S. spends roughly $1 billion a day importing oil ...

Isn't this quite different from "Every day the U.S. imports $1 billion worth of oil"?

[Agloco]

I have. I came up empty.

Status quo tbh.

[boutons_deux]

US actually sends up to $500B overseas to import oil

[boutons_deux]

BigCoal's nasty externalities, ignored by corporate media:

Media Ignore Study On Real Price Of Coal-Fired Power

A study published in the prestigious journal American Economic Review estimates that the costs imposed on society by air pollution from coal-fired power plants are greater than the value added to the economy by the industry. The study concluded that coal may be "underregulated" since the price we pay for coal-fired power doesn't account for its costs.

According to a Nexis search, not a single major newspaper or television network has covered the study. By contrast, an industry-funded report on the cost of EPA regulations of these air pollutants has received considerable media attention.

The authors of the American Economic Review paper -- Nicholas Muller of Middlebury College and Yale's William Nordhaus and Robert Mendelsohn -- are considered centrists. Mendelsohn opposed the Kyoto climate treaty and spoke this year at the right-wing Heartland Ins ute's conference on climate change.

Economist Paul Krugman wrote that the study should "be a major factor in how we discuss economic ideology," adding "It won't, of course." From Krutman's post:

It's important to be clear about what this means. It does not necessarily say that we should end the use of coal-generated electricity. What it says, instead, is that consumers are paying much too low a price for coal-generated electricity, because the price they pay does not take account of the very large external costs associated with generation. If consumers did have to pay the full cost, they would use much less electricity from coal -- maybe none, but that would depend on the alternatives.

At one level, this is all textbook economics. Externalities like pollution are one of the classic forms of market failure, and Econ 101 says that this failure should be remedied through pollution taxes or tradable emissions permits that get the price right. What Muller et al are doing is putting numbers to this basic proposition -- and the numbers turn out to be big. So if you really believed in the logic of free markets, you'd be all in favor of pollution taxes, right?


http://mediamatters.org/blog/2011101...County+Fair%29