by Eugenie Sage
Climate change is our most serious environmental issue, yet the Resource Management Act ignores it when coal mining companies seek permission to dig up millions of tonnes of coal because these companies only do the digging, not the inevitable burning.
This week’s Environment Court decision that coal mining’s contribution to climate change cannot be considered during resource consent processes under the RMA reveals an urgent need for reform.
Bathurst Resources wants to mine over 4 million tonnes of coal on the protected Denniston Plateau, which will produce 11 million tonnes of carbon dioxide. Solid Energy is currently angling for permission to take 4 million tonnes of coal from its proposed Mt. William mine, which will generate a similar amount of carbon dioxide once it is burned.
The fact that the RMA is unable to consider the effects on the climate of pushing at least 22 million tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere is madness. Mining coal is only once-removed from burning coal and yet our present RMA treats them as unrelated.
The Government has its head down a mineshaft in relation to climate change given this gap in the RMA and also its failure to rein in its SOE, Solid Energy, with its mining plans at Mt William.
A 2004 amendment to the RMA, which we opposed, restricts decision makers to considering only “the effects of climate change” on such activities, not the other way around.
The fact that our legislation that deals with environmental management cannot deal with the most profound environmental issue facing the planet – the changing climate – is nonsensical.
Published in Environment & Resource Management by Eugenie Sage on Thu, May 3rd, 2012
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on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
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Eugenie, if the RMA did consider emissions from burning coal as you suggest, then the people who sell us oil would have to be responsible for the emissions coming out of our cars. That is obviously ludicrous, therefore, we have an international climate change framework. You may argue that it is not a good framework, and I would agree with you (although perhaps for slightly different reasons), but that’s where the debate should be.
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Still trying to figure out when this climate change thing is going to happen, I see I am in good company with even Professor Lovelock is re thinking the whole thing which is a real worry considering it was his idea in the first place. There has been NO warming in 15 years and it worries me that we are sacrificing job opportunities when we might have got it a bit wrong.
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Is it correct that there has been no warming in the last ten years?
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“Unfortunately, these [recent] statements by James Lovelock are inconsistent with up-to-date climate data sets.”
http://world.edu/james-lovelocks-climate-change-u-turn/
“It is a strawman argument to expect temperature trends to change smoothly, or to highlight periods when temperatures have risen at low rates or even declined, and at the same time overlook the mean decadal trend where measured temperatures have risen during the 20th – early 21st centuries by more than 1.0 degrees Celsius (see Figure 1).”
“Given the above it remains a mystery as to the nature of the evidence or reasons underlying James Lovelock’s statements.”
Surely, this apparent U-turn has nothing to do with “The new book, due to be published next year, will be the third in a trilogy, following his earlier works”
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If all you look at is the temperature without looking at the forcings involved you wind up making a lot of mistakes. I was always of the opinion that Lovelock was overdoing it, and it appears that he will overdo his corrections as well.
The answer is that the Temperature is forced by a number of things, including the sun, the state of ENSO and Volcanoes and the CO2 and CH4. A good analysis is here.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/trend-fr.php
or here
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2011/12/06/the-real-global-warming-signal/
One can see that there is warming happening when the sun and the cyclical lows of ENSO both are pushing things the other way. The temperature never goes “down” it only goes up or stays flat, but if all you look at is temperature, you have to see nearer 20 years of data to be sure you have statistically coped with the noise and your accuracy will suck. The advantage of Foster and Rahmstorf’s work is that they reduce the noise so we can more readily understand the trend.
Bernie… maybe financially (that seems to be the only thing some people understand) one has a problem “allocating responsibility” but responsibility is something we TAKE… and if we dig it up and sell it to someone else to burn we must take responsibility for the result.
Which makes it a pretty irresponsible thing to be doing. Not too surprising that this is the preferred option for National.
David… Ole’ Lovelock ain’t that old. The understanding of the Greenhouse goes back to Arrhenius. It has been a long long time in the making and Lovelock had very very VERY little to do with the science around it. His principle contribution has been outrageous opinions and predictions and the Gaia theory of the earth as an self-regulating organism. His work on measurement of trace gases is arguably a sounder basis for respecting him but human caused climate change was around long before he got into the act.
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/index.htm
If you have real questions I’ll try to serve up references and answers.
respectfully
BJ
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Coal is not inevitably burned. It can be used as a feedstock for the plastics industry.
The RMA does cover such things as the climate change effects of methane gas released during coal mining and other damage caused by the mining operation.
Meanwhile Genesis have obtained further resource consents for their Huntly power station:
http://www.voxy.co.nz/business/huntly-power-station-resource-consents-granted/5/122192
Trevor
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Lovelock appears to be unaware of research that tries to factor out temporary forcings that can operate to enhance or mitigate against human caused effects. When the data is corrected for ENSO, volcanoes and solar variability, there has been no let up in warming (apart from the odd year or two, which is to be expected with weather).
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/6/4/044022
As far as the consent process is concerned, yes, environmental impacts should be taken into account. Trevor’s objection is reasonable but all use of coal will cause environmental damage.
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Trevor.
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Sweet Jesus I have found THE solution to climate change!
http://www.nextnature.net/2012/03/will-eugenics-become-an-acceptable-strategy-to-avoid-climate-change/
Breed humans to be smaller and therefore more energy efficient.
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This is one of the best presentations about it… accessible to almost anyone with working brain cells.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mF_anaVcCXg&feature=youtu.be
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http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/05/the-right-and-the-climate-a-new-low.html
We didn’t need any hacking of the Heartland Institute. They are indicted by their own words and actions. They are the poster children for “criminal insanity”… by their own activities.
But at what point do the masses who believe this stuff realize that they were duped?
It won’t be THESE masses. This is inter-generational theft and murder, the favored tool of a democratic society, for the future has no vote. We have been doing it with our economies, there is no doubt we will do it with our ecology.
Homo-Sapiens… an oxymoron in a dead language, describing a suicidal species.
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@BJChip: Because the left would never do such a thing?
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Fascinating Spam… the assault on reality and science is entirely ignorable for you. The science doesn’t matter as long as you can distract us with the argument that both sides are equally guilty of calling names?
Heartland IS a group of psychotic loons who associate science with terrorism and a global conspiracy. They won’t understand evolution and they won’t understand climate science, not because they cannot, but because they will not, the deepest blindness of all.
—————
Some dip with a blog post is not equivalent to a national PR campaign to convince people that believing science is evil in any case.
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To make this a little more clear, they’ve lost on the science. There isn’t any science to show that the CO2 isn’t warming the planet. The debunking of their scientific case has been thorough and ongoing and has continued through the years. The science only gets worse for them.
So instead they resort to this. It is an election issue for them. It is a way to rally the red-rubber-nosed brain-dead ignoranti. Someday you may finally recognize that the science doesn’t take a POLITICAL side here. All it is, is science. It says Global Warming is happening. Not that the left or right should run things. The fact that it can be turned into a left-right issue is ENTIRELY related to the right wing rejection of science… which goes back to discussions about evolution. It is all really really wrong.
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So it’s OK to denegrate a lobby group for a ridiculous activity (yes, I think that the heartland campaign is ridiculously stupid), but Joe Romm gets a free pass for the same stupidity because, err, he’s on your side?
Oh – and rational skeptics don’t dispute that CO2 causes warming, but there is a lot of doubt about the magnitude and effects.
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No, and I didn’t give him a free pass. He can be as stupid as he pleases… BUT HE ISN’T RUNNING A NATIONAL PR CAMPAIGN.
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… and I have yet to meet a rational skeptic. Every last one of them has turned out to be another wingnut wearing a mask. The science isn’t changing, except for getting stronger. Heartland isn’t about rational skepticism in any case. The conspiracy meme is alive and well on the right.
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Yes, he is. Do you really not know who Joe Romm is?
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Bernie. It is not ludicrous to suggest that the producer of a product is responsible for the effects of the end use of that product. Would you argue that tobacco companies have no responsibility for the damage that the use of their product causes?
Climate change is an ethical issue and it is unethical (some would say immoral) for the coal mining industry to sell 8 million tonnes of coal knowing that the use of that coal will add another 22 million tonnes of CO2 to the atmosphere, no matter where it is burned.
Those people involved in promoting the expansion of the fossil fuel industry, when the science is clear on the effects it will have on the climate for future generations, should be having trouble sleeping (or maybe they don’t have kids & grandkids)
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Spam, what nonsense. Joe Romm’s Climate Progress isn’t putting the idea that climate change deniers are murderers in the faces of millions of people every day. Even your linked article doesn’t do that. You seem to think that because the fact that climate change denial motivated one mass murderer was not hushed up and is out in the open, then it’s ok for Heartland to mount a disinformation and smear campaign about global warming and those who back the theory.
That is just utter rubbish.
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This coal is not being used to generate electricity, and I know for a fact that some West Coast coal is used for pharmaceuticals, plastics, and other uses.
This is perhaps why it shouldn’t be considered as part of the global warming problem.
Producing CO2 is not in itself a reason to include something in the RMA, should firewood merchants be included also?
I wish you guys would focus on issues of sustainability instead of this ill considered nonsense.
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There is a difference between buying billboards and radio time, and a blog post on a site that only people who agree with you already are apt to read.
You are STILL trying to distract from the fact denialists are publicly attacking science itself.
The act of associating the opinions of psychopaths with anything is entirely irrelevant.
The fact that Heartland saw fit to turn it into a PR campaign and spent a fair chunk of money doing it, is different from the fact that Romm provides a forum for someone else to post an opinion piece which does the same irrelevant thing… but the way to equate them is their
irrelevance. Heartland itself is however, delusional and run by sociopaths, a very different thing.
Nobody can control what a psychotic will choose to believe, or which side of this issue he will take.
That is very different from the actual actions and beliefs of the denialists, or of Heartland. Most denialists are merely tools, pwned and deluded. They fail to understand or accept available science about the real world, and embrace a global left wing conspiracy theory among scientists in place of reality.
The people building and encouraging the delusion are however, real sociopaths who do not care if they are guilty of inter-generational theft and murder on a scale that dwarfs previous efforts by our more famous misfits AND Goldman Sachs. Some are merely paid shills and liars, the “merchants of doubt”, but there are those who purchase their services.
Power and wealth is to be protected no matter that it renders much of the world uninhabitable.
And by the time they can be charged with any crimes they’ll already be dead.
So it IS a bit different, describing the people who run Heartland as delusional and the people who control it as sociopaths or psychopaths and mass murderers, and comparing people who believe that using science to help us to explain the world around us to mass murderers.
I am not comparing denialists with anyone. I am telling you flatly, that Heartland is delusional as an organization, and that the people controlling it are sociopaths and psychopaths. I don’t need “guilt by association” to make that case.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZQNiDIBxO4
The difference, as Naomi so clearly explains here, is that THIS science has consequences. THIS scientific result requires us to change our business models and put a price on the destruction of the commons.
Some people do not want to argue about what changes to make, and so rather than have that discussion, attempt to cast doubt on the science and the scientists….
…and at core it is a VERY small group of people – less than 1 percent of us… (where has that number come up before?), who are really guilty here.. the rest of the denial movement are wholly pwned tools, and they have no science behind their movement.
If, as you say, you are an honest skeptic, then
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mF_anaVcCXg&feature=youtu.be
this link should have made you think about the risk of what happens if you are wrong about how much of it is happening.
…because the argument really is not about what is happening at all… it is about what actions we have to take to be able to hand our children a planet not much worse for our having used it.
…and we are still NOT having that argument because you would rather defend Heartland by pointing at some other fool.
respectfully
BJ
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Shunda, net production of CO2 by use of firewood is nil. IF the coal were SOLELY for use in plastics and pharma then the mines are simply polluting eyesores (the pits) and the damage is limited…
This isn’t the case as you acknowledge by your use of the word “some”.
BJ
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BJ,
“it is a VERY small group of people – less than 1 percent of us… (where has that number come up before?), who are really guilty here”
No, we are all guilty. That less than 1% are the big polluters (directly or indirectly) doesn’t absolve the rest of us from guilt. No way.
Shunda,
Plastics and chemicals aren’t environmentally friendly either.
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Umm… Suggest you guys try reading what I wrote rather than making assumptions.
@Tony:
You seem to think that because the fact that climate change denial motivated one mass murderer was not hushed up and is out in the open, then it’s ok for Heartland to mount a disinformation and smear campaign about global warming and those who back the theory.
You may have missed where I said: yes, I think that the heartland campaign is ridiculously stupid. At least I don’t excuse the left doing exactly the same thing, just because its on a blog.
@BJChip:
I am not trying to distract from anything. I am NOT defending Heartland. I have said that the Heartland campaign is “ridiculously stupid”. How am I trying to distract from anything? If anyone, it is you who are trying to distract. Instead of just posting something like “wow – yeah, that was stupid too” re ClimateProgress, you instead try to rationalise it for some bogus reason or other, and then try to distract the conversation to science to justify why Climate Progress are right (and therefore they can be excused) and heartland are wrong (and therefore very dangerous psychotic loons etc etc).
To summarise: Both the Left and the Right have said stupid things. I call them both out for being stupid. Tony & Bjchip try and rationalise for the ones that they support.
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Spam,
You said the Heartland campaign was stupid, quite right. Not only is it stupid, it is blatant lies and misinformation. This is quite different from the Romm edited piece, which is simply stating one of the motivations of a mass murderer.
They are completely different situations and it is ridiculously stupid to pretend they are on the same level.
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Much of the West Coast coal is hard coking coal, suitable for steel manufacturing, and used for this purpose. As such, the coal is used in a chemical reaction and not actually burned, although the result is still the emission of CO2. The reaction reduces iron oxide to iron. Since the iron can be recycled, arguably this is sustainable.
Burning coal at Huntly however isn’t sustainable, but Huntly’s consents were renewed very quietly. One of the arguments put forward by Genesis was that Huntly could be easily converted to burn biomass, not that Genesis appear to have any intention of actually doing this.
Trevor.
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Tony,
You continue to illustrate my point perfectly.
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Spam –
I didn’t try to rationalize Climate Progress. Read what I said again.
I said flatly that Heartland was delusional and run by sociopaths.
I pointed out the difference between a blog posting of something stupid and an organization buying space on digital billboards to announce something stupid. There is a difference, is there not?
Heartland IS under the control of sociopaths.
So right or wrong about reality is not relevant to whether someone is delusional?
Science isn’t relevant for you.
BJ
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@bjchip. net production of CO2 by use of firewood is nil
Kyoto disagrees with you
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Plastics and chemicals aren’t environmentally friendly either.
What an odd statement!
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Shunda, net production of CO2 by use of firewood is nil.
Only if the firewood comes from a sustainably managed woodlot, a lot isn’t.
IF the coal were SOLELY for use in plastics and pharma then the mines are simply polluting eyesores (the pits) and the damage is limited…
The smelting of iron ore involves creating alloys with a high carbon content, this comes from the coal and doesn’t go into the atmosphere.
I know that the process of steel manufacture does release a lot of CO2, but you know as well as I do that no one is seriously suggesting we stop manufacturing steel to mitigate climate change.
The problem is turning coal into electricity, and this is not what NZ coal is used for (except domestically).
I would suggest that the environmental issue regarding coal in this country is almost exclusively due to the direct effect on the landscape when it is dug out, not climate change.
Confusing issues like this is not helpful in my opinion, it does nothing to address the real issues of mineral extraction.
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True.. for wood to be carbon neutral it has to be grown as fast as it is burned. This isn’t always the case.
Shunda…
I am aware of the use of coking coal. It is not lignite which was the last thing I heard mentioned with respect to additional mining. If I know that the mines are for coking coal, or plastics or such, those can lock up the Carbon for some time. The fact that many plastics are burned as waste after one use makes them less fine, but I am not philosophically opposed to their use. It is “fixable”. There is effort involved but it is not necessarily a direct assault on our atmosphere.
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@BJChip:
Despite me saying that what they did was “ridiculously stupid”, you accuse me of defending the heartland institute. If by simply contrasting your attacks on them with your failure to apply the same standards to Joe Romm is “supporting” them, then I would conclude that you “support” Joe Romm’s approach.
From your other comments, I am interested to know as to whether you consider anyone who dares to question the holy bible of the IPCC assessments and their various prophets as “mass murderers” and “criminals”.
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Forget steel manufacturing for a minute. This court decision may have wide implications for other resource consent hearings. Think it’s reasonable to have climate change considered when building a road or designing a landfill? When digging up Southland’s billions of tonnes of dirty lignite? Sorry, this decision says you can’t.
There is no reason why RMA hearings couldn’t take climate change into account – it is simply a matter for the panel to give weight to (amongst other complex things like biodiversity offsetting).
And some situations, such as the Denniston coal, our ‘international framework’ misses entirely. The coal goes to countries with no Kyoto obligations and even when used to make steel 99% of the carbon ends up in the atmosphere.
We’re taking the coal out of the ground, we should take responsibility for that.
Thanks Eugenie for posting.
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Plastics are now getting into the food chain, according to some recent research. So even what is not burned has potential to harm us.
BJ, just because some activity causes potentially fixable problems doesn’t mean that they will be fixed. I see virtually no cause to think that our fixable problems are likely to be fixed. If the problems aren’t likely to be fixed then the activities that cause those problems should be opposed. Accepting behaviours because the problems they cause can be fixed, seems to be the wrong way round.
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“Think it’s reasonable to have climate change considered when building a road or designing a landfill? When digging up Southland’s billions of tonnes of dirty lignite? Sorry, this decision says you can’t.”
Not quite the way I read it. The climate change effects of building a road (e.g. release of gases from the disturbed ground) could be considered, just not those of fossil fueled vehicles using the road. And the climate change effects of gas emissions of a landfill or coal mine could be considered. However if any methane captured is sold, the climate change effects of burning that methane elsewhere couldn’t be considered in the landfill or coal mine application.
But I am open to corrections on this interpretation.
Trevor.
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Trevor, I think perhaps you are confusing the ETS and the RMA, although it’s not clear from your posts exactly where your thinking is coming from. After some outcry by us greenies, I believe, methane emissions from coal mines were included in the ETS. By some miracle National did not remove that. But that has essentially nothing to do with the RMA.
This Environment Court decision explicitly says that greenhouse gas emissions cannot be considered in coal mining resource consents. The implication of the decision is that climate change cannot be considered in any resource consents.
When the 2004 amendment that this all hinges on was written, it was widely expected that a broad-based carbon charge would be put in place. So parliament attempted to write some legislation which moved some climate change emissions away from regional RMA consideration. Which emissions, and what the law actually now says is not clear (hence the legal battle).
But in any case, instead of a carbon charge, we now have a weak ETS which only sort of covers some emissions. Certainly the ETS does not cover exported coal. So new coal mines go ahead, with finely-balanced decisions, and yet the climate change that will result from the coal is not considered. At all, anywhere.
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Tony
My philosophy is to address problems directly, not to address desires that MAY lead to problems.
No wish for a better life, desire to build more houses, instinct for procreation, or pleasure in fast driving is IN ITSELF a problem.
Dumping shit in a river is a problem, creating shit in the first place is not. Emitting CO2 is a problem. Using energy is not.
BJ
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BJ,
Sounds like you’re saying fix the problems as they arise (assuming they can be fixed), don’t try to avoid the problems in the first place. My approach would be to avoid the problems in the first place, then we don’t have to worry about whether the problem is fixable (or becomes unfixable because of scale or feedbacks).
“Using energy” covers a wide range of uses, so, you’re right for some uses but not for others. Of course, neither of us will get our wish so prepare for the worst.
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Sounds like you’re saying fix the problems as they arise
Only if you have a tin ear. I am saying fix PROBLEMS not things that MIGHT lead to problems.
If the problem is plastics getting into the food chain the problem is NOT in having plastics, but using them in such a way that they get into the food chain. Make that a cost to the people who put it there.
If the problem is CO2 production it is NOT big cars, or too many roads, it is CO2 production, so you don’t play games with fuel efficiency standards, but instead put a tax directly on the CO2 production. In terms of governance one has to avoid indirect approaches.
It is perfectly OK to anticipate trouble. We use science and evidence based approaches for that. I won’t restrict people’s use of energy. I WILL make them pay full freight for environmental damage they do to get it. The problem is not the energy use, the problem is the damage.
If you address the energy use instead you wind up with a lot of people regarding you as an intrusive busybody… if it had simply cost more and the costs are tied to damages, those same people haven’t got a kick.
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BJ,
“I am saying fix PROBLEMS not things that MIGHT lead to problems.”
That’s almost what I said except that you seem to think that because some behaviour could possibly be done in a harmless way, then we can somehow magically stop people doing it wrong. That’s wishful thinking of the highest order.
“instead put a tax directly on the CO2 production”
That’s tinkering. Some countries that try to do that offer compensation to the worst hit and so it probably won’t have much of an impact on CO2. If you want to cut CO2 production, you force rationing, like TEQs combined with an Oil Depletion Protocol. That would guarantee continuing reductions but it ain’t going to happen because it will impact growth.
“I won’t restrict people’s use of energy”
Which is why the solutions that you imagine won’t work. Not that there is a solution, since what we have is a predicament, not a problem.
“If you address the energy use instead you wind up with a lot of people regarding you as an intrusive busybody”
Oh dear, we can’t have that, can we? Look, do we have a serious problem/predicament, or don’t we? If we have, then it has to be addressed head on, with strategies that are guaranteed to work, not tactics that we hope will work. Unless we get serious, and soon, then it will be too late, if it isn’t already too late.
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“instead put a tax directly on the CO2 production”
That’s tinkering. Some countries that try to do that offer compensation to the worst hit and so it probably won’t have much of an impact on CO2.
Tony… no major country took the simple tax approach before 2010, those that did would be Finland, Sweden, a couple others in the Eurozone… and mostly at rates that are risibly low. Australia is the largest to actually do a tax rather than an ETS or Cap & Betrayed.
Sweden set a proper tax and put a real rate on it. Sweden has seen as a result, a substantial shift to biomass as a source of fuels. So it DID work. The only country that really did it and they got a real result.
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2010/06/biomass-generates-32-of-all-energy-in-sweden
Real world real result, in a country that IS a democracy. It is something that can be done.
Oh dear, we can’t have that, can we?
Exactly! We cannot have that if we expect to actually govern in a democracy. If we offer solutions that enforce a more intrusive social system we get kicked out on our collectives. We’ve done it in other areas and we are only now beginning to recover the lost political momentum.
Rationing energy? What is the SOURCE of the energy Tony. The penalty is unusually broad in effect, and not sensible of carbon use at all.
Tradeable? We all use money that is based on DEBT!!! A short circuit that makes this really hard to implement. Still, I would encompass a large part of the effect you hope for by basing the money on KWH of work, which would be far more effective… and likely to succeed, than a plan that includes the word “rationing”. Because people would be able to collect more energy and thus have more to use and they would see a benefit in the whip out of the hand of the financial sector… the “oh, and by the way we are limited to the energy we produce as a country” is important, but it isn’t “rationing”.
Oil Depletion is a problem with the supply of oil… and has nothing directly to do with climate change. Oil is used as a lubricant, a base for chemical production… it will in time be regarded as too valuable to burn.
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Cap and trade will become just another financial ponzi scheme.
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“We cannot have that if we expect to actually govern in a democracy”.
BJ. Those words should not appear in the same sentence.
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As long as people remain human, remain uneducated and remain morally and ethically capable of stealing from their offspring… then those words will wind up in the same sentence. It is a shame, and a sin, but I do not know a way to change it.
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BJ,
Sweden is to be commended, though that article doesn’t say anything about the sustainability of what they’re doing. A 50% reduction in CO2 seems possible there, though only for emissions within their own country, not necessarily for emissions of all goods and services consumed in Sweden. It seems they are also exporting a lot of their biomass, which is probably unsustainable as they will have to import the nutrients lost. However, because one country, which has probably had a different mindset for a long time, can find a strategy that seems to have an impact, doesn’t mean that those strategies will be implemented globally in such a way as to have a significant, and long term, impact.
Small steps may be wonderful and some reductions would be nice but if the world reduced its emissions by 50% tomorrow, the world would continue warming.
“Exactly! We cannot have that if we expect to actually govern in a democracy.”
It would be interesting to see what the Greens would do in government but I don’t expect they will try to move to a no-growth economy and probably won’t be able to do much about emissions in a single term. But people’s so-called freedoms will have to be curtailed to move significantly towards sustainability (of which CO2 emission reduction is an important part).
“Rationing energy? What is the SOURCE of the energy Tony.”
TEQs, combined with the Oil Depletion Protocol (applied to all fossil fuels) is guaranteed to reduce emissions from fossil fuels, so I don’t think your question is valid. Renewable energies are also limited, so that would have to be included somehow. I don’t expect any significant action though.
“it will in time be regarded as too valuable to burn”
It will in time not be utilised at all, except at its renewal rate. I think you’re fixated on what you think of as a modern technological society.
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Tony said:
“Renewable energies are also limited, so that would have to be included somehow.”
But the available solar energy’s limit is much much higher than our current energy usage so we don’t need to worry about that limit. The limit we do have is how rapidly we can ramp up the use of solar power, and part of the problem there is strong opposition from vested interests, i.e. the coal and oil industries and the politicians and astroturf organisations (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astroturfing) that they fund.
Trevor.
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“But the available solar energy’s limit is much much higher than our current energy usage so we don’t need to worry about that limit.”
This is repeated so often that one might think it must be true but it isn’t. For starters, we can’t just use the solar energy that is incoming (apart from the simple uses of allowing it to help our plants grow or in simple technologies like solar drying or passive solar heating). We have to harvest it somehow, concentrate it and convert it into something we can use, and distribute it for that use. So there are limits to that. Also, we are diverting an energy source that is already completely employed in the energy systems of our environment. What the practical limit of that diversion is is unknown at this point but you can bet that most people will simply assume that it’s not a problem, no matter how we do it. So far I haven’t really seen a proof of that assumption, though I have seen some research on limits to the diversion of wind energy.
Let’s not assume any more. Look where assumptions have got us.
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Tony – we are not going to divert enough sunlight to have a significant effect any time soon. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_energy says there is 174 PW (PetaWatts) of solar energy falling on the Earth – that is 174,000 TW. Our current power needs are around 23TW (TeraWatts) or a little over 0.013% of the power from the Sun. We could harness this using just 0.5 million square kilometers – about 0.1% of the surface area of the Earth. I expect we are already covering more area than that with roads, paving and buildings.
The effect of most of the sunlight falling on the Earth is to heat it. The effect of most of the energy that we harness is eventually to be lost as heat. So temporarily diverting the sun’s energy to other purposes isn’t going to make any long-term changes – it will still end up as heat.
Trevor.
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Trevor, citing those numbers proves absolutely nothing; you are still making assumptions. The localised effects may be significant (and thus the effects on a wider area may be significant). We just don’t know and citing low percentages doesn’t mean a thing, depending on how it is harnessed. And you also ignore my point that it actually takes resources to harness the sun’s energy.
Yes, we are already significantly affecting our environment but that is no reason to make matters worse.
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Tony
If the goal is to reduce the burning of fossil fuels, then the quotas need to apply to fossil-fuel-derived energy, NOT to energy in general.
This is the difference between what you and I want.
If the goal is to create a “no growth” society, then the ECONOMIC system we use to manage resources in our society has to change. It cannot be done by any amount of regulation, quotas, legal maneuvers, marching in the streets, industrial action, environmental protest or ANY other of the tools available. The only way to kill it is to put a stake through its heart.
Break the debt-as-money-with-interest cycle. Anything less fails.
No matter how clever it APPEARS to be. Money is like heat in the study of thermodynamics. It ALWAYS finds its way into entropy.
except at its renewal rate
Like I SAID, too valuable to burn.
But people’s so-called freedoms will have to be curtailed to move significantly
Tony, that is a statement and a recipe’ for permanent exclusion from government. An ecological disaster in one sentence. You DO NOT advocate things that curtail people’s freedoms in a democracy and retain the ability to form government.
The only way to get where you want to go is through gaining power in government and altering the underlying economic principles under which people are exercising those freedoms. Change the reasons why they make the decisions they make. Remove the NECESSITY of economic growth from the principles on which the economy is based.
This will ultimately result in “less freedom”, through strictly economic changes, the things that cost heavily in terms of energy will become less accessible. They will NOT however, become illegal.
You cannot confront the existing system and win. You cannot stand in front of these bulldozers, they will run right over you. You have to alter the reality on which they base their actions.
I think you’re fixated on what you think of as a modern technological society.
You and I don’t need to repeat that old argument again. It is tedious and neither of us are going to change the other’s notion of what human civilization should ultimately look like.
You said everything you were going to say, I said all my counter arguments and nothing is changed. We can skip all the actual typing.
I will argue the solar thing separately.
BJ
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This is repeated so often that one might think it must be true but it isn’t. For starters, we can’t just use the solar energy that is incoming (apart from the simple uses of allowing it to help our plants grow or in simple technologies like solar drying or passive solar heating). We have to harvest it somehow, concentrate it and convert it into something we can use, and distribute it for that use.
Tony… except for the bit that is currently reflected back into space (the albedo), every erg of solar energy that hits the planet eventually becomes heat. Even more, it is re-radiated. It does NOT matter if it is passed through a collector and a motor before it becomes heat, any more than it matters if it passes through a plant, a pig, some bacon and a burp.
Let’s not assume any more. Look where assumptions have got us.
Yes Tony, let’s not try anything new for fear of making some error. Lets not replace the things we know are bad with the things we THINK are good because we can’t PROVE they’re OK for the next million years.
This is not acceptable to me. I won’t stand for it from anyone who works for me or from anyone I am likely to vote for and I AM a Green.
If you want to form a “no more growth” party and advocate to power down society and return to some idyllic past that never existed feel free … because you will never get past any threshold of voters required to have any say whatsoever in anything if you AT THE SAME TIME refuse to even try to supply additional power that is available outside the fossil fuel industry because you are afraid to deplete the wind and sun of energy.
That is what you just did. My answer is that extremes like that are utterly incapable of gaining support. Nor are they the correct answer for our society as a whole.
There is not going to be enough in the short term, to make that transition quickly, which is why most of the developed world needs to build nuclear as well.. but Heinberg’s vision failed entirely when the process of fracking unlocked the natural gas reserves for consumption.
His vision does not deal with the direct problem. Taxing CO2 emissions deals with the DIRECT problem.
BJ
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BJ said:
“…which is why most of the developed world needs to build nuclear as well.”
I wouldn’t say “most of the developed world”. Instead I would say “much of the developed world”. Countries with low population densities and high isolation levels don’t need nuclear power. Countries such as New Zealand and Iceland also have enough other renewable energy sources not to need nukes. It is countries such as India, Germany, England, France and Japan that would have difficulty meeting their energy needs just from renewables that should use nukes.
I would rather that countries that already have nuclear power plants build additional plants than to have new nuclear plants built in countries that don’t already have them, purely from a safety angle.
However I would rather see additional nuclear power plants built than additional coal-fired plants. We must cut back on our coal usage.
Incidentally, one way of reducing coal usage is to add solar pre-heaters to coal-fired power plants. Australia already have at least one such installation.
Trevor.
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Perhaps I should have said “by population”… most approximates much pretty well.
I’d allow as any new nuke that burns waste as well is OK in general. Oz has solar, we have wind and geo and hydro, Iceland has geothermal. The US has (if it does its homework) solar and hydro and geo and wind (well, it is a big place).
Not building enough of anything yet though… the price of CO2 emission has not been driven up enough to make that practice stop. So the natural gas and fracking is the popular “next move”.
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BJ,
“If the goal is to reduce the burning of fossil fuels, then the quotas need to apply to fossil-fuel-derived energy”
Well, currently all energy is fossil fuel derived as it all needs oil to be built, operated and maintained. But, yes, that would be a good first goal.
“Like I SAID, too valuable to burn.”
And, like I said, consumed only at its renewal rate. We can’t become dependent, again, on any resource that will peak and decline, by consuming it beyond its renewal rate.
“except for the bit that is currently reflected back into space”
You’re missing the point, just as Trevor did. How you harness the energy will affect the environmental impact. If you harvest it from space, then you may be adding more heat to the system (eventually, the earth will reach a new state when the radiated heat equals incoming but it won’t be nice getting there). If you harvest it in massive arrays (some talk about ones square kilometres in area, for example), then you may well have localised impacts. And localised impacts can have regional impacts, which can have global impacts. If it’s very distributed and point of use, then there may be no significant impacts but you can’t just spit out percentages relative to the total solar flux to prove anything.
“Yes Tony, let’s not try anything new for fear of making some error.”
Don’t be silly, BJ. I didn’t say don’t do something new. I’m saying be cautious, do the homework, proceed carefully and keep checking. But don’t assume that we can have as much as we want as quickly as we would like, without there being any environmental impact.
“If you want to form a “no more growth” party and advocate to power down society and return to some idyllic past that never existed feel free”
I didn’t read past this because you are clearly in your own world, regarding the meaning of anything I write. No-growth is certainly desirable, since growth is unsustainable. Beyond that, I’m not advocating an idyllic anything, I’m advocating sustainability. If it’s not sustainable, it’s not going to last. If you prefer unsustainable, that’s up to you but, if the Greens advocate unsustainable behaviours, then they are, ultimately, no better than the other parties.
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Nuclear is unsustainable and dangerous, even more so given that it requires stable societies for many generations, even centuries, to have a chance of being safe.
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BJ – the difference between “much” and “most” could come down to whether countries such as Saudi Arabia should build nuclear power plants. They are considering it. I believe they would be better off building solar photovoltaic arrays and concentrated solar thermal plant instead. Certainly the time to get a nuclear plant going is much longer than practically any alternative. Current nuclear plants require U235 which has a limited supply too.
Trevor.
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We can’t become dependent, again, on any resource that will peak and decline, by consuming it beyond its renewal rate.
Horse puckey. We can depend on anything we have access to for a short period. We can use what is available to transition the more stable long term supplies.
We can and should be doing that now, but cannot do it because the PRICE SIGNAL TO FORCE IT TO HAPPEN IS NOT IN PLACE. You keep going to direct action, which has never had any long term effect on the distribution or overuse of resources. Hell, prohibition didn’t even work on alcohol, and that isn’t even a necessity.
If you harvest it from space, then you may be adding more heat to the system
If we can harvest it from space we can also reflect any amount we choose. The temperature of the planet is then under our direct control.
But don’t assume that we can have as much as we want as quickly as we would like, without there being any environmental impact.
I don’t. I accept that there will be SOME environmental impact from whatever we actually do. IF WE ACTUALLY DO ANYTHING AT ALL.
I also understand that this is happening and will cause damage to our civilization for centuries to come if it is not stopped quite quickly.
So I want immediate action to reduce CO2 emissions – at almost ANY cost, because even at the lowest climate sensitivities imaginable we are offering a catastrophic problem to our children.
I don’t want the perfect solution to all our problems that becomes available after all of civilization is destroyed, I want workable solutions to THIS problem, now.
Workable, in a democracy, includes the ability to get a policy/solution passed into legislation.
If we want people to “reduce CO2 emissions”, we do not attempt to get them to sign on to a TEQ and Oil Depletion Protocol.
Also… A specific requirement gets less resistance when trying to bring in a tax or regulation. Anything else allows us to be painted as eco-extremists who want to bring on the new “dark ages”… because we won’t build any new energy sources for fear of upsetting the fish, birds or neighbors…
We can’t build renewable sources fast enough to replace the coal plants that have to come off line even if we try (well maybe, if we went at it on a “war” footing), and we aren’t trying. We can’t build nukes that fast either. The Fracking of the planet and replacing coal with natural gas is not exactly what I call a positive development given the fugitive emissions problem. A CO2-CH4 tax will result in big changes in our emissions of those gases because it DIRECTLY addresses them. Anything else is self-deception.
A no-growth economy does not actually address the emissions at all. We could for instance, go to no-growth with LESS efficiency in the use of fuels.
To get to a no-growth economy one has to redefine the basis of the economic system. It is a separate problem. It is not as urgent as CO2 is.
BJ
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“Horse puckey. We can depend on anything we have access to for a short period.”
Although you sound like a little kiddie with that first comment, we can’t actually depend on anything that we can’t depend on, because we will have to wean ourselves off that dependency, in due course. As we’ve seen from the fact that regular conventional oil is now in decline, we are not particularly good at weaning ourselves off dependencies. And yet you think it’s OK to go for another dependency that we will need to wean ourselves off of.
“If we can harvest it from space we can also reflect any amount we choose.”
Ifs and maybes. You don’t want me to have what I want and I’m afraid you can’t have what you want. If harvesting solar from space is seen as a way round energy declines, there will be attempts to do it. There is no reason to hope that the other thing you mention will be attempted. Almost no-one gives a damn about the only habitat we know that we have.
“So I want immediate action to reduce CO2 emissions – at almost ANY cost, because even at the lowest climate sensitivities imaginable we are offering a catastrophic problem to our children.
I don’t want the perfect solution to all our problems that becomes available after all of civilization is destroyed, I want workable solutions to THIS problem, now. ”
For practical reasons, I’ll agree with you here. I don’t think there is any way that we can run our modern industrial civilisation on renewables, so going full pelt to renewables will, effectively, be a power-down scenario. I’ll keep my fingers crossed that the destruction of our entire ecosystem can at least be halted by a shift to renewables.
But advocating nuclear is definitely not the way to go, as we face converging crises that will definitely have a destabilising effect on societies.
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Almost there. Almost. The problem is that we have to get people to do the one thing that we REALLY need them to do, right now, real hard, and that is to reduce CO2 emissions.
Nuclear is not SUSTAINABLE… but it provides usable power at less CO2 cost than other things. The point I was making about getting people to do what is necessary remains, and they will not agree to it if they see that everything possible is not being done to preserve their way of life.
I don’t think in the long run, that our modern industrial civilization is economically sustainable using the economic system we are using in any case. The LONG run however, is not the immediate problem.
The immediate problem is getting people to agree that CO2 has to be reduced, and to take the measures necessary to reduce it, even in our current economic system. The target is CO2, not energy use, not changing civilization, not creating a new societal model. All that other stuff is negotiable over a far longer time window than we have available to deal with the CO2.
Sweden shows us that a heavy tax, directly imposed, on the emissions brings about the desired changes. Whether or not renewables can ultimately power our current form of consumption based economics is immaterial to me. I think (given access to space) it could, but the economic system wants to be changed anyway and I am happy to do that because no-growth economic models are needful for us.
Just not the most important thing over the next decade or so.
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BJ,
http://www.carbontax.org/progress/where-carbon-is-taxed/
While sweden does have a tax there are some serious loopholes for industry. The ones getting hit the hardest are the electricity end user.
With minimum wages paid is NZL, are we collectively in a position to tax the electricity end users more?
You advocating higher electricity prices above what we already are struggling to pay for while alternative energy solutions are implemented?
Good in theory but not practical.
When would the carbon tax be removed from electricity if the magic 100% renewable sources were achieved?
Taxes are so easily but into place, but they never seem to come off again.
Suggest an alternative model is required. Sweden is not a good example for New Zealand.
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Gerrit. The best model is tax and return.
Tax carbon producers and give an equal tax cut to consumers to compensate. Economically neutral, but gives a big incentive to reduce carbon.
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The next best is tax producers to subsidise green house gas reducing technologies such as green buildings, sustainable energy and lower emission industries.
For example, changing the present subsidy for long distance trucking to coastal shipping.
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Gerrit – with the percentage of electricity we have being generated by renewable sources already, the percentage of tax that would come out of electricity SHOULD be smaller. I didn’t say “do exactly what Sweden did” but was making the point that if you want to reduce CO2 production you tax CO2 production. The market gets to sort out the means… and will do so efficiently. A hydro dam doesn’t cost any tax, neither does the wind or geothermal source.
Could this lead to finishing the electrification of rail between Auckland and Wellington? Could it put more transport load on the rail lines? Make us look harder at more efficient cars?
BJ
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BJ,
Problem remains is that once a tax is on it never comes off. Yes renewable generation would see as all in electric cars sooner so am all for it.
We still need a discount model for electricity generated by renewable sources versus those generated by coal.
The electricity currently used by my computer can come from Karipiro hydro or Huntly coal. As i’m not in a position to differentiate, I cant make an informed choice not to use Huntly electricity but if in Sweden would be taxed irrespective.
So how to put into place a disinsentive for my electricity supplier to use Huntly coal generated electricity versus an incentive to use Karapiro hydro.
We must tax emmisions as Kerry says but again I dont trust any government (left or right) to return emmision taxes to the people when we get to 100% renewables.
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Gerrit – If we need a discount model then we should think of one.
If we measure the CO2 output of Huntly and the output of all the other supplies to a particular generator company we can work out the tax that that company has to pay. Best to measure the emissions at the stack… You get to pay whatever rate they have to charge to meet their supply costs. The folks with more renewables will be able to charge less. You DO get a choice. Right now the renewables based folks wind up costing us more.
The notion that the tax is there “forever” may be true, but the CO2 emissions that are being taxed will not be.
“I dont trust any government (left or right) to return emmision taxes to the people when we get to 100% renewables.”
Do you have to? After all, if it is truly an EMISSIONS tax it has to go to zero when we stop emitting.
We need to apply it so it isn’t just on the electric power companies. It has to hit the transport sector as well. The cost of trucking things long distance will go up.
What else I don’t know. Those two though, should be enough to bring us to a very much more renewable based economy than we have. An advantage in the long run, if we work out how to keep the cheap and non-renewable based products from overwhelming us. I think we can.
BJ
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Fair enough BJ, but leave nuclear power out. Please. I don’t think any more nuclear power stations will be built but, if I’m wrong, that will be an awful legacy to leave to future generations.
Economic growth is probably over, anyway. I’m not sure that it will take too long for governments to realise that, as they struggle to get it going again (aside from manipulated official statistics). NZ unemployment is stuck. US unemployment would be over 13% (even by the narrowest measure) if the participation rate was what it was in 2001. Governments (aka taxpayers) are loaded down with debt and countries are falling back into even official recession, or teetering on the brink.
It’s a long painful process, collapse. Don’t expect any significant action on climate change. I don’t. In a sense, it will take care of itself, as the dominoes fall, though there is dangerous change already built in.
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Kerry,
I don’t quite understand how taxing producers but compensating buyers, for the inevitable higher prices, will cut emissions. It may help a little, as people see prices rise, they may, perhaps, not fully factor in the tax break and cut down, even though, in principle, they can afford the higher prices because of tax breaks. But I just can’t see that kind of scheme actually having much of an impact on emissions.
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A CO2 charge applied at the smoke stack of power companies wouldn’t be fair if they employ co-firing – burning a mixture of coal and biomass. You would need to apply a carbon tax on the coal.
Genesis have stated that it would be easy to adapt Huntly to burn biomass, but I am not aware of any evidence to suggest that they are actually intending to do this.
Trevor.
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Tony – an increase in the price of electricity will encourage electricity users to look at efficiency and insulation improvements. They will also consider alternatives such as solar water heating. A higher electricity price makes the payback period for any such measures more attractive, whether of not they get a compensating tax cut or benefit increase.
It doesn’t matter whether a particular tax stays or goes. Governments need money and will take it. In a democracy, if they try to take too much and don’t justify it, they risk being voted out. Emission taxes can stay forever as their take falls as emissions fall (as previously noted by BJ).
Trevor.
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Good point about payback time, Trevor. However, I just don’t think enough people will think very hard about efficiencies and alternatives, if they are compensated for increased costs.
What we need are guaranteed reductions. We aren’t going to get them.
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On the contrary. People aren’t going to link their tax cut or benefit increase to the rise in electricity prices and will complain about the latter – and hopefully react by cutting back their electricity use.
The big electricity users will pay more. The frugal users will pay less. The tax on CO2 will therefore reward and encourage the frugal users.
Trevor.
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If you say so, Trevor. But I just don’t think incentive schemes (especially when continuing with the same behaviour has no real, or little, financial impact) provide the guaranteed reductions in emissions that we need. I didn’t say it would have no impact but your posts seem to imply that the response will be perfect. As all market responses are, of course.
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Nothing is guaranteed Tony, but a tax on CO2 will push electricity prices up and make renewables more attractive. If the tax rate is high enough, the reduced demand and increased renewables will allow the renewables to supply 90% or more of our electricity needs. With good demand-side controls based on sensible price signals, even higher levels can be achieved.
Not everyone has to behave sensibly. Those that don’t will be penalised financially, and will help pay for the new renewables.
Trevor.
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Trevor,
If it was a matter of behaving “sensibly”, then no tax would be needed to do that. What you are describing are incentives to behave “sensibly”. If that incentive is not perfect (because, if the amount returned to buyers equals the extra costs, there is no overall cost in buying the same amount of dirty products) then the response won’t be perfect. You imply that there is some price (“if the tax rate is high enough”) at which a 90% renewables target will be reached. Do you know what that is?
By the way, I predict now that any tax and return policy will not result in reduced emissions (on its own).
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Tony – you misunderstand me. I am referring to a sensible response to the CO2 tax, i.e. a sensible response to the incentive.
If the tax and return are zero-sum, then individuals can gain by reducing their demand, e.g. by insulating. It is not zero-sum for individuals, only for the government.
And no, I don’t know what level of CO2 tax would be required to achieve 90% renewable electricity generation. It doesn’t actually matter, as the government can raise the tax until the objective is achieved.
I’ll predict that a tax and return policy will result in reduced emissions if it is implemented.
Trevor.
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With Trevor and Kerry on this. Tax and Return WILL reduce emissions. The level Sweden used was about 5 times the risible amounts that National proposed here.
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Trevor,
People can gain, now, by reducing their energy use. My monthly bill, from Meridian, is about $120, which is a lot less than anyone I’ve asked, concerning their bill. Yes, in a zero sum game, then the incentive does increase, because people can save more for every kilowatt hour or litre of fuel they don’t use – though they will spend those savings on something else and the overall effect will be less than was hoped.
So, tax and return may have some effect, but I doubt it, on its own, will do anywhere near enough to matter.
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Tony – when the pay back period for an electricity saving feature such as solar water heating approaches the life of the unit, then it isn’t worth installing. Add a CO2 tax and increase the price of electricity and the pay back period shortens significantly and now it is worth installing.
And it is not just the electricity consumers who are affected by a CO2 tax. Increasing the tax on CO2 makes coal and gas plants less attractive and suddenly stalled wind and geothermal projects get the go-ahead. Genesis might even start co-firing coal with biomass at Huntly.
Trevor.
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