Michael, I'm completely snowed under right now, but I can't let this pass. You are woefully, disastrously wrong on this. I hardly know where to begin. (And you don't seem to have read Kevin's post very carefully, as he does not at all take your position.)
I've been in DC all week, talking to Congressional aides, members of Congress, and folks from NGOs about this, and let me tell you, everybody knows it's a scam. Everybody knows it's a sop to the coal industry. It's a greedy grasp for handouts by coal state Democrats. Even the coal-state Democrats know it. What's on the table are massive, massive public subsidies to an industry that, at the very most optimistic projections (including the development and wide deployment of these fantastically expensive sequestration facilities, funded by our tax dollars), will produce a fuel that's roughly equivalent, CO2-wise, with gasoline. We will be displacing a modest amount of oil at /enormous /cost, with no gain on global warming. It's about opportunity costs. There isn't unlimited money to spend. Every dollar we spend needs to displace oil AND reduce GHG emissions. The amount of money we're talking about shoveling to the coal industry (which by the way has a century-long record of making and breaking the law, misleading the public, killing the people that work for it, irreparably scarring landscapes, and rent-seeking -- why on earth would you accept that they've suddenly become a responsible partner in this fight?) could do far, far more good, in terms of both energy independence and global warming, spent elsewhere. Here's another tip: quit hiding from the imaginary hippies under your bed. Just because greens oppose this doesn't mean it's more "mature" or "helpful" to support it. Consider whether the green movement might contain lots of smart people who have run the numbers, who have assessed the urgency of the problems and the range of solutions on offer, and have decided /on the merits/ that this is an outright scam that needs to be met with concerted, vocal opposition. Nuance for nuance's sake, when the facts don't merit it, isn't maturity, it's vanity. Michael Tobis wrote: > I think that if there is a clear and serious mandate for carbon > sequestration as a condition of the subsidy it is a very very good > idea. If there isn't such a mandate it is a very very bad one. > > Risky business that may require a more mature political process than > we can muster. Most greenies aren't being helpful at all. > > see http://initforthegold.blogspot.com/2007/06/coal-thing.html and an > article linked from there by Kevin Vranes at Prometheus. > > mt > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Global Change ("globalchange") newsgroup. Global Change is a public, moderated venue for discussion of science, technology, economics and policy dimensions of global environmental change. Posts will be admitted to the list if and only if any moderator finds the submission to be constructive and/or interesting, on topic, and not gratuitously rude. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/globalchange -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
