Comments on: CERAWeek 2009: Why Didn't Daniel Yergin Question Climate Alarmism–and Both Cap-and-Trade and Carbon Taxation? http://www.masterresource.org/2009/02/ceraweek-why-didnt-daniel-yergin-question-climate-alarmism-both-cap-and-trade-and-carbon-taxation/ A free-market energy blog Sat, 11 Feb 2012 20:41:38 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Donkatsu http://www.masterresource.org/2009/02/ceraweek-why-didnt-daniel-yergin-question-climate-alarmism-both-cap-and-trade-and-carbon-taxation/comment-page-1/#comment-463 Donkatsu Mon, 16 Feb 2009 15:04:38 +0000 http://masterresource.org/?p=924#comment-463 Related point: Not discussed at all at CERAWeek or elsewhere is an obvious point, similar to the arguments in a previous thread about automobile efficiency. If you want to reduce emissions and save fuel in the US, then go after the oldest least efficient generating units and replace them with better technologies. There is a way to make great environmental progress from the power sector of the US if one is serious about it, and not merely looking for new instruments of social control. The fastest route to cutting US emissions of the actually harmful (SOX, NOX, particulates), along with the putatively harmful (CO2), is to (i) put the 23 already designed new nuclear reactors on a fast track for approvals and construction; and (ii) put the 83 coal-fired power plants now awaiting permits and approvals on the construction agenda. These projects represent roughly 200 GW of firm generating capacity. The environmental case for nukes is inarguable, except for the ignorant and willful (or the willfully ignorant). The case for new coal plants is equally strong. Coal power plants, though just 32% of total generation capacity, provide more than 50% of kWh generated. At least 200 GW of that coal generation capacity is 30 years old or more (20% of total generation capacity and 35% of total energy output). These plants are due for replacement over the next 10 years, and the nuke and coal plants now on the table are the only reasonable alternatives on offer for the US. New coal combustion technology is much cleaner for the regular pollutants (SOX, NOX, particulates) and uses at least 20% less coal per kWh than the plants they will replace. If the enviros were actually serious about cleaning things up even more than we have over the past 30 years, they would understand that the fastest route to lower emissions and reduced coal consumption is the replacement of older coal-fired plants with newer ones. And talk about shovel-ready! The nuke and coal plants now in regulatory limbo represent at least $350 billion of new investment over then next 5-10 years, none of it requiring federal or state monies, thousands of highly paid jobs, and, when the plants are operating, several tens of billions of dollars per year in tax payments by the profitable generation of power from these plants. The other alternatives on offer, primarily wind, will remain scant, or negative, energy and fiscal contributors, leading to another boom in gas-fired power plant construction as the older nukes and coal plants wear out. Related point:
Not discussed at all at CERAWeek or elsewhere is an obvious point, similar to the arguments in a previous thread about automobile efficiency. If you want to reduce emissions and save fuel in the US, then go after the oldest least efficient generating units and replace them with better technologies.

There is a way to make great environmental progress from the power sector of the US if one is serious about it, and not merely looking for new instruments of social control. The fastest route to cutting US emissions of the actually harmful (SOX, NOX, particulates), along with the putatively harmful (CO2), is to (i) put the 23 already designed new nuclear reactors on a fast track for approvals and construction; and (ii) put the 83 coal-fired power plants now awaiting permits and approvals on the construction agenda. These projects represent roughly 200 GW of firm generating capacity.

The environmental case for nukes is inarguable, except for the ignorant and willful (or the willfully ignorant). The case for new coal plants is equally strong. Coal power plants, though just 32% of total generation capacity, provide more than 50% of kWh generated. At least 200 GW of that coal generation capacity is 30 years old or more (20% of total generation capacity and 35% of total energy output). These plants are due for replacement over the next 10 years, and the nuke and coal plants now on the table are the only reasonable alternatives on offer for the US. New coal combustion technology is much cleaner for the regular pollutants (SOX, NOX, particulates) and uses at least 20% less coal per kWh than the plants they will replace.

If the enviros were actually serious about cleaning things up even more than we have over the past 30 years, they would understand that the fastest route to lower emissions and reduced coal consumption is the replacement of older coal-fired plants with newer ones. And talk about shovel-ready! The nuke and coal plants now in regulatory limbo represent at least $350 billion of new investment over then next 5-10 years, none of it requiring federal or state monies, thousands of highly paid jobs, and, when the plants are operating, several tens of billions of dollars per year in tax payments by the profitable generation of power from these plants. The other alternatives on offer, primarily wind, will remain scant, or negative, energy and fiscal contributors, leading to another boom in gas-fired power plant construction as the older nukes and coal plants wear out.

]]> By: Ed Reid http://www.masterresource.org/2009/02/ceraweek-why-didnt-daniel-yergin-question-climate-alarmism-both-cap-and-trade-and-carbon-taxation/comment-page-1/#comment-462 Ed Reid Mon, 16 Feb 2009 00:44:23 +0000 http://masterresource.org/?p=924#comment-462 "Where have all the flowers gone, long time passing?" Serious science prostrate before ponderous politics. (BOHICA) Serious businesses feeding the alligator in the hope it will eat them last. (Tick tock, tick tock.) Snake oil salesmen peddling their wares. ("Good for everything that ails you.") "When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?" “Where have all the flowers gone, long time passing?”

Serious science prostrate before ponderous politics. (BOHICA)

Serious businesses feeding the alligator in the hope it will eat them last. (Tick tock, tick tock.)

Snake oil salesmen peddling their wares. (“Good for everything that ails you.”)

“When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?”

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