> We see this now in the electricity business. A fifth of the world's > electricity and a quarter of the world's new electricity comes from > micropower -- that is, combined heat and power (also called cogeneration) and > distributed renewables.
I think this is highly misleading. The only way to get such figures is to count stuff that is anything but "micro" (such as co-generation in petroleum refineries or large scale hydropower projects). What is conventionally known as microCHP (<100 kW) has a negligible market share and even that largely because of very generous subsidies. Not to mention that it's near exclusively fueled by oil and gas. http://www.microcheap.eu/ Methinks that Amory Lovins is trying to hit the right levers with free market type voters, however, you just can't neglect the role of governmen, which determines taxes, subsidies and the regulatory environment. It's not that hard to regulate things out of existence, eg simply don't allow build (natural gas fired power in the 80's in the US), or ask for huge safety add-ons that result in 4 year construction times becoming 10 year construction times at twice the capital cost (nuclear power in the 80's in the US), or demand that no wind power be built within 100 miles of US borders or airbases due to the potential for radar interference. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ 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 -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
