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Post by aquaduct on Mar 4, 2009 13:14:09 GMT -5
"I’m posting my thoughts here to see, very seriously, what the more intelligent folks here think of it." Did any of them show up? Yes. Thank you all. |
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Post by Supertramp78 on Mar 4, 2009 13:16:21 GMT -5
Interesting post Ann. From what you said the chain of events was as follows:
1. Government deregulates industry
2. Industry takes advantage of lack of regulation to gouge consumers
Not exactly the traditional pitch to sell deregulation but it doesn seem to happen all too frequently.
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Post by John B on Mar 4, 2009 13:22:27 GMT -5
In Ann's defense, it was only a partial deregulation. Of course, I forget what the details were, but I remember the discussions back then.
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Post by aquaduct on Mar 4, 2009 13:24:41 GMT -5
And I guess I should add that another prominent policy option being considered is to simply cut to the chase and increase the price of energy through carbon or other taxes. That would at least have the advantage of transparency and predictability as well as avoiding shortages.
The big downside to cap and trade that hasn't seemed to enter the public debate is legislated shortages, which I believe is much scarier than raising costs.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 4, 2009 13:30:33 GMT -5
Any comments on [battery storage]? I'm not too up-to-date of energy production. That's exactly right. Electricity is effectively non-storable at the industrial level. It is produced at the instant it is used. That makes things pretty hard. If we had an efficient storage mechanism, things like wind and solar would instantly become much more attractive. But we don't. And its not for lack of trying. Its been known for 100 years that efficient storage of electricity is a concept worth billions. Come up with that, and your great, great, great grandchildren are set for life. "I do think, however, that eventually getting off a finite resource like fossil fuels will be a big step for progress" Why? Why? Because it is, for all practical purposes, finite, as it gets more difficult (and expensive) to extract enough to meet the growing demand. That alone should be enough reason to look around for alternatives, at least for transportation purposes. |
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Post by omaha on Mar 4, 2009 13:31:17 GMT -5
Interesting post Ann. From what you said the chain of events was as follows: 1. Government deregulates industry 2. Industry takes advantage of lack of regulation to gouge consumers Not exactly the traditional pitch to sell deregulation but it doesn seem to happen all too frequently. Well, it was never really deregulated in any meaningful sense. But that's not important here. The power industry is a classic natural monopoly. Lots of states and jurisdictions manage to have affordable, reliable power based on a system of private ownership and state economic regulation. Its boring and it works. And even a market-driven conservative like me can support it. I think Ann's instinct is spot on: These new cap and trade systems are of a piece with California's failed experiment. This all falls into the category of "leave well enough alone" in my view. From a societal perspective, delivering affordable, reliable power to consumers is not a particularly hard thing to do. We figured it out 100 years ago. There's nothing exciting or sexy about it, but that's ok. Leave it alone. Let the system work. Misguided attempts to improve it are far riskier than we think. |
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Post by Doug on Mar 4, 2009 13:47:58 GMT -5
Aqua I like the way you explain it with the guitar thing.
Jeff:
I don't see that as right. I see the grid being a storage mechanism. Now there are for sure ups and downs with time differences they should be handled by the grid. Inefficiency can be handled by spreading the grid to different time zones. While not truly a storage mechanism it acts as one.
Maybe we could have time adjustments so big users (aluminum plants for instance) could use their elec in the off hours.
All of the technologys to get energy from the sun involve at some stage the transformation of carbon atoms. Carbon bonds are by natures laws the storage mechanism for solar energy be it in oil, wood, or other chemical processes. Store it by creating some types of carbon bonds, release it by breaking those bonds. Sure you can use similar atoms and create storage then the release product is sulfur dioxide or something similar much more toxic than than CO2. Can't get around nature which figured out this energy storage thing long ago.
I don't see how any carbon regulation system can't be riddled with harmful unintended consequences.
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Post by omaha on Mar 4, 2009 13:55:11 GMT -5
I see the grid being a storage mechanism. Now there are for sure ups and downs with time differences they should be handled by the grid. Inefficiency can be handled by spreading the grid to different time zones. While not truly a storage mechanism it acts as one. But all of that goes on today...utilities continuously evaluate the costs of buying vs generating, and when they buy from others transmission (ie "grid") losses are just part of the equation. But that's not the same thing as storage. Back in the early 1990's, there was a burst of hope that room-temperature super conductors would allow for lossless transmission. That opened up the possibility of a world-wide interconnected grid of solar power. The sun is always shining somewhere, and if we can losslessly move that power anywhere in the world, we could have effectively free, zero-impact power. Didn't work out. Turns out that room temperature super-conductors didn't exist. As for the aluminum plant, etc. Industrial rates are already based on time-of-day. I used to be intimately involved in the rate calculation for a couple of paper mill customers of our utility. The rate they were on was hundreds of pages long, and designed to send clear economic signals to the mill that incented them to put the least amount of stress on our system. Residential customers are billed on simple kWh meters because in the past they were cheap and the rates were easy to understand. Unfortunately, they created the impression that electricity can be bought like we buy gasoline. It doesn't work that way in reality. With new digital meters, we will probably be seeing more time-of-day and peak-load billing of residential accounts. |
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Post by Marshall on Mar 4, 2009 13:57:01 GMT -5
So I'm skeptical of cap and trade. Just seems a work around to allow companies to continue to polute until they run into the cap or run out of people to buy polultion from (same deal probably) and then what? Shut down? Pay a fine making their products even more expensive? Anyone remember what Enron did to california electricity costs? I'm trying to imagine that nation wide. It bothers me. Aqua probably did a better job of defining it than I. But that won't stop me from chipping in. The idea is to incent lowering polution (and CO2 if you put that greenhouse gas stuff in the mix), and punish production of the above. If you're a dirty company, you have to buy clean rights from cleaner industries; thus incenting clean industries even more to be even MORE clean, as they get their investment back in spades. I think you set up a polution and/or CO2 stock exchange. The government doesn't set the price. The marketplace sets the price. And we know how well markets are at determining true value. The Devil is in the details; whichever side of the fence you are on. |
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Post by epaul on Mar 4, 2009 14:07:59 GMT -5
There are boondoggles and shenanigans galore that could, and already have, occur with this CO2 cap and trade business. But I do think it is a mistake to assume any initial "cap" will be something set in stone.
If the initial cap proves ridiculous or unacceptably expensive in the light of the current understanding and need, the cap will be raised. And if the president and legislators in place at the time fail to recognize this, they will be replaced.
Conversely, if understanding and need combine to support the need for the cap, it will just be something that needs to be dealt with.
If data and trends coalesce and clarify, strict caps will have strong and general support.
If the data and trends remain uncertain and murky, and brownouts and rates both rise to unacceptable levels, look for the caps to hit the toilet.
If we stay in between somewhere, (most likely event) look for increased energy costs but lots of work for scientists and engineers.
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Post by epaul on Mar 4, 2009 14:10:43 GMT -5
There are way too many assumptions flying around this whole climate change and alternative energy business. Many are or will be accepted down the road as mistaken. And the biggest mistaken assumption is the one we are making right now if we think we know which of the dozen CO2/climate change "scenarios" is right one.
The idea that scientists working in this field share any consensus other the a few basic general ones is horse hooey. The Energy and Environmental Research Center in Grand Forks is one of the larger and more respected energy research centers in the world. My wife works there as research director, along with 500 other scientists and engineers from across the globe (the place looks like a mini-UN). At the EERC there is universal agreement that CO2/Climate Change is a political reality. There is a general consensus that anthropomorphic CO2 in the atmosphere likely has a warming effect on our climate. After that, there is no consensus.
How significant is the role of CO2 in the family of greenhouse gasses? (H2O is by far the most prevalent greenhouse gas and methane is easily the most potent) There is no consensus. There is no real good idea. The relationship of greenhouse gasses to each other and in significance to each is recent work that is just beginning.
Are greenhouse gasses driving an abnormal and harmful planetary warming trend? No consensus. This is new stuff. The role of the ocean and tertiary soil and plant life is work in process.
The most relevant scientists, Geologists, are at loggerheads on CO2 and long term Climate Chante. Atmospheric folks, like NASA, tend to support the more dire predictions, but the geologic tend to think we are well within, and will remain well within, long term, very long term, climatic patterns. (this is a very general stereotype I have formed from listening to dozens and dozens of these guys, in person and through my exposure to interviews and NOVA-type media productions. But the two groups, in general, are taking very different measurements and are reaching different conclusions).
And there are some who think it is an equal proposition as to whether we will be warmer or colder fifty years from now. The earth and the sun also can get cooler. When and why isn’t known. We have been hotter and colder. Can one trend reinforced by an unprecedented CO2 release steamroll the trend off the table or just moderate or forestall the other, opposite trend?
As to how many think there is any reliable science behind those future weather reports that contain semi-specific regional temperature and rainfall predictions for thirty to fifty years from now, there is a very broad consensus that such predictions are silly and without any serious underpinning.
(and if you ever read the entire report on any of these thirty-year computer generated forecasts the media so partially presents, you will read that the computer programers involved in the circus say that that there are extreme shortcomings in the programing, and the data, used for such far-off weather forecasts. These regional weather forecasts issued for thirty to fifty years from now are just jokes intended to serve a researcher’s purpose. And that is how they are regarded by any informed scientist who isn’t intent on serving the greater cause, whatever it might be.
I don’t mean to suggest that any of these scientists (well, maybe the one who drinks heavily and lives in a basement) are as cavalier about anthropomorphic atmospheric CO2 as Doug is. There is concern and there is interest. But once a few general areas are left, there is no consensus.
This we know.
#1 A belief that our carbon energy use is bad for the planet and should stop will fit too easily into some personal paradigms. A belief that elitist ecco idiots are running amuck will fit well into others.
#2 The sheer difficulty and expense involved will make it hard for the unsure neutrals to embrace an unyielding carbon-less gameplan.
#3 A pathological fear of atomic energy will keep the one solution that could make everyone happy off the table until sheer desperation presents no other choice.
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Post by omaha on Mar 4, 2009 14:17:58 GMT -5
Quick PS to my earlier comments about batteries...
If you want to make you great, great, great, great grandchildren very rich, in addition to efficient industrial scale battery technology, you could also invent room temperature super-conductors (which in reality are probably the same thing).
I hope Paul is right. His sensible three points sound true to me. I worry, however, that he discounts the effect of the activist in this scenario. There are indeed "eco idiots running [amok]" out there who don't care (and in fact celebrate) if their plans damage the economy. While they are few in numbers, they are high in intensity. They could never sell their intentions to the moderate center of the electorate, but they don't have to. They just have to insinuate themselves into the federal bureaucracy and operate behind the scenes.
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Post by aquaduct on Mar 4, 2009 14:20:23 GMT -5
Thanks epaul.
Very good summation. Trying to stay away from that since that train has pretty well left the station and trying to focus on the immediate policy quagmire, but I do appreciate your doing that work for me.
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Post by epaul on Mar 4, 2009 14:37:38 GMT -5
EERC.
About half the EERC work is with coal. North Dakota is one of the major coal states.
But the other half of the EERC is involved with windpower and biofuels. North Dakota ranks at the top when it comes to suitability for windfarms. And North Dakota is one of of our leading agricultural states.
There is huge support for coal, wind, and biofuels in North Dakota. And not only is North Dakota one of the very few states whose economy is not in the toilet, its economy is nowhere near the toilet.
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Post by aquaduct on Mar 4, 2009 14:38:45 GMT -5
I hope Paul is right. His sensible three points sound true to me. I worry, however, that he discounts the effect of the activist in this scenario. There are indeed "eco idiots running [amok]" out there who don't care (and in fact celebrate) if their plans damage the economy. While they are few in numbers, they are high in intensity. They could never sell their intentions to the moderate center of the electorate, but they don't have to. They just have to insinuate themselves into the federal bureaucracy and operate behind the scenes. It's an interesting thing to watch and it's not really that the activistsare taking over the government. Like epaul, my wife is now working in the sciences with the feds and there's no shortage of hesitation as to the policy directions that we're taking based on some kind of consensus which really doesn't exist. Heck, I found my current global warming intellectual hero deep within the scientific bowels of the U.S. government. But they've certainly found the riegns of power and public opinion in politically motivated agencies like EPA (who stands to rule the world if a few more things flip thier way) and the U.S. Congress. I do see a slim bright light in that the activist methodology of regulation by litigation seems to have run the extent of its logical course. Hopefully these things are so messed up at this point that they can't be un-done without exposing the underlying nonsense. I just hope it's before something like cap and trade get etched in stone. |
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Post by epaul on Mar 4, 2009 14:43:40 GMT -5
Carbon credits.
I am in currently beginning to check out the emerging market for carbon credits. The CBOT (Chicago Board of Trade) has opened a Carbon Credit Exchange market.
I recently received a letter expressing interest in brokering some of my conservation acres on the Carbon Exchange market. This stuff is just getting started, and my guess is that anything you wish to say about it will be true.
Some carbon exchanges will be fodder for the darkest of cynics. Others will be Ok. (impossible to say how significant their impact of the legitimate ones will be)
A couple examples of offers I could accept as a landowner.
The general deal: Land that is idled and allowed to grow into perennial grasses and trees (think prairie, meadow, and forest) will take CO2 out of the atmosphere and store it in the soil. As long as this land is left undisturbed, the CO2 will continue to grabbed out of the atmosphere and sequestered in the soil. The carbon exchange idea is this, some company that emits carbon will pay a landowner to take his land out of production and allow grasses and such to grow and do their thing.
Specific Offer A:. Ducks Unlimited is paying farmers a fee if they will sign a lease agreeing in perpetuity (99 year lease with option to renew) to keep said land in grasses and far away from the carbon releasing plow. This will sequester CO2 (and provide nesting habitat for ducks).
Specific Offer B. A group called Dogwood Corp. is offering to broker some of my Conservation Reserve acres on the CBOT as carbon exchange credits. The offer is for the remaining years of the CRP contracts, which is generally ten years or less. When the CRP contract expires, so does the exchange credit payment, and if the farmer wishes to plow up the CRP and plant it or sell it, he can. This will effectively sequester no CO2, it will just tie it up for ten years or so and then dump it into atmosphere once it is worked up and farmed. Big Hooey!
There will be decent deals and there will be a lot of action for scam artists to create bullshit deals. If the percentage is 50/50, we will be doing great. Better than great. I am not a cynic, but there will be a lot of crap involved with this pony.
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Post by patrick on Mar 4, 2009 14:46:47 GMT -5
Very interesting post Aquaduct. And an interesting scenario. I would hope that the ultimate legislation setting up the system would have a "safety" built in that would allow for such a possibility, rather like the proposals this last summer to temporarily repeal the gas tax.
I think that a carbon tax would be a better solution, especially a tax on imported energy. That would use the marketplace to lower carbon release and also use the market to lower our dependence on overseas sources of energy.
But it may be too late for that mechanism alone to lower carbon emissions enough to meet global warming requirements. And it has it's own political problems.
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Post by patrick on Mar 4, 2009 14:50:30 GMT -5
And not only is North Dakota one of the very few states whose economy is not in the toilet, its economy is nowhere near the toilet. Well, if North Dakota would ever get indoor plumbing, a LOT of the state would be closer to a toilet. Geez, talk about Luddites! |
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Post by RickW on Mar 4, 2009 14:54:05 GMT -5
Aquaduct, I would say we are more likely to all go to hell through the worst predictions of global warming, then we are to put in a cap and trade system that causes serious damage by being inflexible. Because if the power was cut off, and people could not work or eat - even if the power was cut back as it was in California, the general public would quickly not give a rat's patootie about global warming. That would be the end of it.
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Post by aquaduct on Mar 4, 2009 15:00:41 GMT -5
Carbon credits. I am in currently beginning to check out the emerging market for carbon credits. The CBOT (Chicago Board of Trade) has opened a Carbon Credit Exchange market. I recently received a letter expressing interest in brokering some of my conservation acres on the Carbon Exchange market. This stuff is just getting started, and my guess is that anything you wish to say about it will be true. Some carbon exchanges will be fodder for the darkest of cynics. Others will be Ok. (impossible to say how significant their impact of the legitimate ones will be) A couple examples of offers I could accept as a landowner. The general deal: Land that is idled and allowed to grow into perennial grasses and trees (think prairie, meadow, and forest) will take CO2 out of the atmosphere and store it in the soil. As long as this land is left undisturbed, the CO2 will continue to grabbed out of the atmosphere and sequestered in the soil. The carbon exchange idea is this, some company that emits carbon will pay a landowner to take his land out of production and allow grasses and such to grow and do their thing. Specific Offer A:. Ducks Unlimited is paying farmers a fee if they will sign a lease agreeing in perpetuity (99 year lease with option to renew) to keep said land in grasses and far away from the carbon releasing plow. This will sequester CO2 (and provide nesting habitat for ducks). Specific Offer B. A group called Dogwood Corp. is offering to broker some of my Conservation Reserve acres on the CBOT as carbon exchange credits. The offer is for the remaining years of the CRP contracts, which is generally ten years or less. When the CRP contract expires, so does the exchange credit payment, and if the farmer wishes to plow up the CRP and plant it or sell it, he can. This will effectively sequester no CO2, it will just tie it up for ten years or so and then dump it into atmosphere once it is worked up and farmed. Big Hooey! There will be decent deals and there will be a lot of action for scam artists to create bullshit deals. If the percentage is 50/50, we will be doing great. Better than great. I am not a cynic, but there will be a lot of crap involved with this pony. My advice is to wait. There are no legitimate carbon markets just yet since there really isn't a force of law behind any of it. They're just kind of like an advertising exchange- "Look kids! We paid some donk farmer to not plow his fields! Aren't we green?!" Waxman's (D-CA) threatening to roll his cap and trade bill out this month in the House and Boxer (D-CA) is pledging to roll out the Senate bill along around June and Pelosi (D-CA) and Reid (D-next door to CA) are promising passage this summer. The real bucks for not doing anything with your land will come when the legal shake down rolls out in full force. |
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