Redstate

I realize taxing your fellow man is appealing to some, but as the article pointed out all conceivable carbon reduction schemes had little to no effect.

Consider a 2006 study from the International Energy Agency. With present policies, it projected that carbon-dioxide emissions (a main greenhouse gas) would more than double by 2050; developing countries would account for almost 70 percent of the increase. The IEA then simulated an aggressive, global program to cut emissions based on the best available technologies: more solar, wind and biomass; more-efficient cars, appliances and buildings; more nuclear. Under this admitted fantasy, global emissions in 2050 would still slightly exceed 2003 levels.

So even if you accept the premise that CO2 is causing Global warming and that its a bad thing. (Most warming is set to occur where it is cold and dry making it warmer and wetter, also occurs preferentially at night overall sounds like a desired effect). Your proposed solution will have only the effect of damaging the world economy

OH JOY.
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"I also agree that it would be ideal to tie carbon taxation to measures of warming."

You sure your responding to the correct blog? You and your type of thinking just scare me... The future may really be as dim as it seems...

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."

Did you miss this in the OP?

But Samuelson is right in putting out his cautionary statements and an upcoming article of mine (written for the American Enterprise Institute's magazine) will take up the argument made by others that any carbon tax should be expressly tied to actual warming.

My post is a response to that.

-jb

but that is not an excuse to tie tax to something that is NOT expressly caused by man...now when it actually is (very unlikely), let me know...

I don't believe in raising taxes - "just in case"...

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."

I'm asking, why you would want to do that ? Whats the upside man ? We would have to kill ourselves just to get back to where we were 4 years ago. The Goreacle and crew say thats not good enough, so whats the point ?

If it isn't going to do the job, why bother ?

You would definitely want it to be tied to warming, so that it can phase itself out when no longer useful. One of the cardinal rules of any new tax or spending program is to provide a mechanism for it to sunset itself if the need goes away.

For the second part, if you are responding to Joliphant's post where best practices just maintain CO2 output at 2003 levels, that would actually be a success. I don't think anyone really thinks we are going to eliminate CO2 output, or bring CO2 levels back to preindustrial levels (in the foreseeable future). Mitigation of the increase is the goal. It's a tradeoff, what you give up versus potential mitigation of negative consequences. The point of a carbon tax, were that the chosen mechanism, is the help the market include the externality of warming when it determines the cost of CO2.

-jb

If a carbon tax is enacted, you actually think that it will be tied to warming...and ever be abolished...? Are you naive?

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."

We will keep discussing harebrained schemes like ethanol and wind power because they're right here, right now, and some people will make a lot of money, very temporarily, because of them. And even people in Massachusetts like Deval Patrick who don't ever want to see another power plant of any kind built anywhere will benefit, because they'll guilt-trip people into paying more for the energy they already have, transmitted through obsolete and poorly-maintained distribution networks.

But they're not the answer. They're punting the ball down the field and subsidizing technologies that will be obsolete (or already are obsolete, environmentally unsound, more wasteful than the quantity of energy they produce, etc., etc.)

The only thing that is going to force America to really explore the only alternatives is an incredible amount of economic pain. We're too stupid to do it the easy way.

the number one feed-source for our food-chain and number one food sweetener additive -- is a recipe for disaster. We are setting off a cycle of inflation as all food costs rise, while the benefits of ethanol as fuel cost mileage.

At the same time, through increased mileage mandates we expect our domestic auto companies to achieve impossible standards whil saddling them with an inferior fuel.

Brilliant!

Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
www.race42008.com
www.hinzsightreport.com
www.theminorityreportblog.com
"One man with courage makes a majority" - Andrew Jackson

BTW it is only a top sweetener (ubiquitous) because there have been big subsidies in place for a long time. Ethanol is only the latest and largest such boondoggle.

And for much of this we can thank former Senator Dole R-Archer Daniels Midland.

"Nothing works like freedom, Nothing succeeds like liberty"
Kyle

and be cross examined by Johhny Cochran on the issue of global warming or monkey feet, something

Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
www.race42008.com
www.hinzsightreport.com
www.theminorityreportblog.com
"One man with courage makes a majority" - Andrew Jackson

A crisis in the making... Oh yea, lets just destroy the food pricing for the sake of lower fuel costs! If you leave it to Congress, that is what will result...

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."

You are too restrictive on what could be part of a long term solution. What goes under the name cellulosic ethanol basically is exoatmospheric solar energy, we are just using nature's precreated method of turning the light rays into storable energy. Corn based ethanol is a complete dead end, however, it may or may not even be better carbon-wise than coal. Wind power is a fine thing to promote, it will just never be the whole solution.

And you have to remember, conservation truly is not a four letter word (just four syllables). I definitely believe LED lighting will move into the mainstream sometime in the next couple of decades. Given that up to 30% of electricity generation is for lighting and LEDs can reduce that by 80%, that would be a huge benefit. There are many more places where gains can be made if we choose to do so, it's just how we weight the cost of energy versus the cost of upgrades/different technologies.

Base power load will always need to be provided by a constant, plentiful source which pretty much boils down to your three options. The best method to get there, ask the market and see what it comes up with. Do we have the courage to ask the question?

-jb

We should NEVER be wasteful of our resources, but conservation is NOT the answer. We have a dynamic growing and thriving economy, and unless we want to watach it come to a screeching halt, we need ever more energy to fuel that economy. Just to stand still we will need double our present energy requirements in 10-15 years. If we intend to grow, we need more power.

With emerging energy needs from China, India and the third world nations, we had better NOT be thinking small, or we will become a third rate nation of our own.

OIL might not be the long-term answer, but we sure as h*ll better be drilling anywhere and everywhere in the short-term as we develop other alternative energy sources -- because the need is NOT going away, and dependency on regions of the world that are unstable, and/or hate us is certainly NOT the answer.

LED's? Sure, we do get a heck of a lot of light out of a small device -- I use an LED for my light system when riding (my bike) through the winter, but I wonder about widespread domestic use.

on the horizon that could possibly make a quantum leap in energy conservation. I am talking about microwave ovens and other appliances that would operate at near 100% efficiency.

True we have to plan like that will not happen because we cannot be certain, but I do not think the future is bleak.

There is also a large amount of energy in the ocean in the form of hydrates.

"Nothing works like freedom, Nothing succeeds like liberty"
Kyle

energy in Utah, Colorado and Wyoming than in the entire middle east. The envoro-whackos and the Democrat Party keep our hands tied. Wait, they are one and the same. They will stand in the way untill there is a train wreck with our current supply. It then may be to late.

and don't leave out Virginia and Kentucky.... Reasonably clean energy is not our problem... Overcoming the rigid environmentalists is...

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."

only a delaying tactic (not necessarily bad) and will require some form of energy that is yet discovered or at least not economically feasible. In time, hopefully, another energy alternative will become available...if not, we do need to use what we have - an abundance of coal. That may mean that we just have to find a way to "clean" coal burning, but technology may provide that answer...if only the environmentalists allow it.

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."

but I hate those that don't allow comments... Give me a much better prospective.

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."

even as we speak. Will soon allow comments

thanks

cold fusion
switchgrass
geometro-thermal
perpetual motion
and that alien device in area 51

"Nothing works like freedom, Nothing succeeds like liberty"
Kyle

Capturing all the Hot Air in Washington to power Sterling generators.

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CongressCritter™: Never have so few felt like they were owed so much by so many for so little.

This hamster isn't running fast enough to power my air conditioner. The hamster needs more motivation.

I don't count any of those as viable. It's kind of sad that people still haven't done the math, as Los Alamos National Laboratories has done, and concluded precisely what I have.

Central power station demands in industrialized countries should be *rising* not falling. The problem is even more acute in soon-to-be-behemoths like China. The answer to the world's problems in terms of both energy and pollution is not *less* energy, it's vastly *more* energy -- a production capacity at least an order of magnitude greater than what we have now.

If you want to recycle things economically, and you want to put everyone in *real* electric cars with zero emissions, and you want to provide people with a higher standard of living throughout the world, without giving Al Gore any more ammunition than he already has, there are really only a few options.

We're devoting more money looking at the little gouge on the bottom of the Space Shuttle (which was caused by environmentally-friendly foam that Al Gore legislated) than we are taking a serious look at what we should be doing for the future -- 20 years, 40 years, 200 years down the road.

If you really think about what you would want for future generations -- and I'm talking 1,000 years out, not your grandkids, what you'd like to see is more people in this country funding real alternative energy choices much more aggressively than they are at this point. Instead we're piddling around with things like ethanol, hybrid cars, windpower, and terrestrial solar. All of them are steps backward in comparison to what we *could* be doing, at a cost that's still a fraction of the HHS budget each year, at least half of which gets flushed down the proverbial toilet.

Let's say we funded those true alternative energy sources aggressively and a breakthrough happened because we did. It wouldn't necessarily mean that electricity had to become "too cheap to meter" and our entire economy would collapse because of that. What you could do instead is index a tax on power in an inverse relationship to its cost, based on what it costs right now. In other words, the municipalities and the government would still get their tax money, but the overall cost of the energy to the consumer would still decline, and everyone would still make a lot of money, including the government -- which we all know by now is so important to both parties that they wouldn't have it any other way.

Can't imagine our wonderful Congress looking forward 1000 years, make that 10 years when deciding policy..yea, a shame but that's the way it is.

In reality, we will have to do with what we have an abundance of (coal) until other opportunities come along. I feel confident though that other energy sources will be discovered within your 1000 year time frame.

Yes, I agree with you that pain will result because of energy needs and maybe only that will cause the effect required to continue into the future. If not...well, kiss the good ole Earth goodbye...

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."

well, just a bit... I do not have any doubt that new and exciting energy means will come along. The only restriction I see now is how we limit our energy usage until then. Since the rest of the world will be using energy at an ever-increasing rate, our only hope is science - and I have faith that alternative energy sources will be found. To believe otherwise is to condemn humanity to the dust bin. Ah, but the fishes will survive...

Actually a bit depressing to think about it in your terms... sigh.

Formally known as Deagle... "Golf is a way of life..."