I'm still feeling Tycho's argument is the most compelling. Excepting the hypothesized (and greatly overhyped) 'we run out of oil tomorrow' argument (which is limited primarily to cars), it seems like the free market really is perfectly positioned to deal with this. Power costs rise, the value of energy efficiency drops. It's nice to say 'always buy the most energy efficient thing', but that ignores the energy (and rare elements) used to make that thing. A prius uses several pounds of rare earth minerals. When those are gone, they're gone. You can't generate more. That's it. A lightbulb that costs 1,000 volts to make but saves me only 800 over its life, even if it burns fewer watts than its less efficient cousin is not a good deal. Don't through out your inefficient but functioning refrigerator for a new, efficient one; it's a net loss in power and materials, and the market reflects that.

Right now, barring fossil fuels and uranium, our power is naturally replenishing. If you don't use it, you don't get a gold star. It's gone. So why be more efficient on that count? And regarding fossil fuels (coal) and uranium, we have more than we're likely to use before those technologies are superseded by something else altogether. So yes, use the power! Don't choke yourself and try to save a little sunlight for tomorrow. If you're using too much power, the cost rises, and you either pay to support more infrastructure, or you stop using so much. Seems pretty straightforward to me :)

The thing that is confusing is that these technologies, with a high up front cost and a long pay out, should be implemented when interest rates fall, but that does not seem to be happening. Of course there has been an economic depression at the same time, but when banks are offering less than 1% return on savings then a light bulb which produces a 3% return in energy savings and an inestimably long life span (LED's) would seem to be a good buy, when I can understand why it might have less appeal when there is a 5% return at the bank. so the question is why are these things not being demanded when the interest rates are vanishing.
Of course just because the hand of teh market is invisible does not mean it is intelligent. It matches demand and supply with prices, it does not insure intelligence will guide the demand. Which is why Doritos line the grocery store shelves and Americas waistline is expanding.

That's an interesting point. I could only guess that usually special fuel efficient technologies are still priced higher than just getting a smaller car. So while truck sales have been falling in favor of hybrids, compacts still cater to those people who just aren't willing to put down $15k for a car, regardless as to the monthly payments.

I will also say that, looking at my family's driving habits, buying a hybrid would cost more and cause more environmental damage than buying a non-hybrid. We just don't drive enough to make those efficiency savings pay off.

That assumes we can switch quickly enough to prevent a crisis. You're probably to young to remember the energy crisis of the 70's, when gas prices rose so high, our entire economy was threatened.   Infrastructure is slow to build and develop, and cannot adapt as quickly as the market can change.

The energy crisis in teh 70's was a manufactured crisis caused by 2 factors- 1) the US adopted a policy of relying on foreign oil to preserve American reserves in order to be teh last country with oil left and 2) the midle east slowed production to jack up prices. Niether of those are really free market events.

Also Katisara, while the Prius uses a great deal more resources and energy to build to where it is not actually eco-friendly, other hybrid brands are much more friendly to teh environment. honda in particular had one of the first cars which actually saved the average person money over a 6 year ownership, back in 2004 when gas prices were much lower than they are now.

I just wanted to say seeing the actual politics and major special interests involved I don't see any big move towards alternatives to coal and oil anytime soon in the US, China (whose cranking out coal power plants) and India anytime soon.

The issue here is until we have to change in the USA we won't and that is based on money is a coal or natural gas fired powerplant going away they are cheap technologies. Nuclear power after Japan is not going anywhere here in fact in my state people want the local one not repaired and decommissioned and not build a new one even though its approved. And the alternatives are not cost effective or entirely practical based on existing technology.

Show me the alternative to oil? Gasoline you can still produce cheaply, move around easily, it produces more energy than it costs to process by a good amount and has other advantages like its flexible useable in land, air and sea travel means. Hydrogen is not there and might never be, electric engines are possible but would have to be much better to be practical to sell.

So is there a point I agree its happening, humans are largely to blame but nobody will move to mitigate the damage if there is no real cost benefit to do so. If solar power on houses was a fifth the current cost and easy to add people would use it if it produced enough power in a modest space in a few decades we will get there. Until then its an expensive luxury to me to add to a house.

I suggest we begin adapting to the warmer Earth since sea level rise is not going to happen overnight the simple solution is to be as the waters rise relocate people to inland locations as needed. A slow migratory shift from say New York City to other cities over a century or more simply by not protecting the city as waters take over land people will have to move. If temperatures are rising we need better air conditioning and city cooling technology. At some point the three major governments will have to act until then we should prepare that nothing will happen on this until the technologies get practical to do. Example an electric car that is inexpensive and can go 600 miles on a charge would be sellable, solar power you can add to a house for a few thousand dollars and just plug in and leave along most of the time etc.

I drive something like 10 miles a day, total. Everything else is mass transit. That honda would have to be awfully cheap to be worthwhile (especially around here where people drive like idjits, and a car surviving past six years is a bit of a gamble).

Remember, I don't buy into the "green" movement as much as I buy into the "sustainable" movement, and even then not as much as some.  The fact is, the market can be manipulated.  Let's say China and Saudi Arabia conspired to lock up much of the world oil supply. The net result would be gas and energy shortages tomorrow.  The solution would be electric cars and renewable power, but how quickly could we get that into play?  Unlike an energy crisis, it can't happen tomorrow.

If we cut back and begin conversion now, we're less vulnerable to when the next energy crisis hits.  That's just common sense.

That's true, but that's only one side of the equation.  There are benefits to cutting back now, as you point out.  But there are also costs involved.  The question of which cuts to make depends on how the benefits and costs of each stack up against each other.  How much definite suffering now should we suffer to avoid some potential suffering at some unspecified future point?  To make a rational decision we have to have some idea of how likely the problem you're trying to avoid it, what time frame we're expecting it, etc.

Of course, those of us who think using fossil fuels is also driving climate change, that add another benefit to the cutting back side.

In reply to RubySlippers (msg #263):

That seems to be going too far in the opposite direction, to me.  It's sort of a "I see a problem coming, but I'm not going to do anything to prevent it, I'll just deal with it when it gets here," stance.  I agree that people won't change their energy use until there is economic incentive to do so, but in my view that's a reason to create incentive, rather than to throw up our hands and say "it can't be done!"

That goes back to the quitting smoking argument.  Cutting back now is less fatalistic than cutting back later.  If we started pushing electric cars, started passing laws to make all new cars hybrid or electric within ten years, we'd have plenty of time for infrastructure to adapt.

Fact is, sooner or later we will suffer another energy crisis.  We're technically in one now, but since the rest of the economy is in the hole as well, it's often ignored.  From my reading, this time we can't just pressure OPEC to produce more oil, since they're already at peak capacity.

Sustainable energy might be the way of the future, but how long will it take to bring into play.  And how much NIMBYism will we run across finding a place to put new power plants?

Yes, but the question is whether cutting back our use of energy now will be more costly than doing it later.  I'm happy to accept that it could be, but you haven't really demonstrated it, and there's a real chance that it might not be.  Is your position based on the assumption that it will be, or is it based on more than that?


Er, wait, now I'm confused.  Are you suggesting we switch to electric cars?  I thought that was the sort of thing you were opposed to.  They aren't really reducing the total energy used (at least not compared to a compact car), and seems to be continuing the kind of things you're trying to reduce.  Not saying it's a bad idea, I'm just a bit confused that you seem to be promoting it giving your previous comments that seemed to indicate you viewed such options as not going far enough at best, and counter productive at worst.


If the current amount of energy is the crisis we're hoping to avoid, it seems like market forces should be able to deal with it, no?  If this is the bad thing that's coming, how can we prevent it by cutting back even further?


The time required to bring alternatives online is definitely a problem, as is NIMBYism.  One draconian way to reduce NIMBYism would be to reduce the distance electricity can be transmitted from it source through regulatory means.  People don't want to see wind turbines, but if they have to pick between seeing wind turbines or a coal fired power plant (or having no electricity), they might be more open to them.  I don't think people would ever get behind such an idea, though.  That said, reducing energy use will also face opposition.  I don't think it's entirely fair to say "we shouldn't use alternative power because NIMBYism will make it hard to implement" and then turn around and say we should lower overall energy use, since that's going to be even harder to implement.  I'm all for both, but both will face stiff opposition.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14768574

Saw the above in the news yesterday, and thought I'd share it.  Apparently the journal that published the paper spoonk had pointed us to a while back has retracted the paper and the editor has resigned, saying the paper shouldn't have made it through the review process.  I'm guessing this will follow the normal way of things, where the initial report gets quite a bit of news coverage, but the retraction gets little to none.

UPDATE--I misread the article above.  the editor has resigned but the paper has NOT been retracted.  This is very odd and seems likely to be aimed at getting attention.  I'll try to keep up with the story and let you guys know if more comes out of it.
This message was last edited by the GM at 09:28, Tue 06 Sept 2011.

If the choice is "Reduce power use or we'll do it for you", people will get in line.  California is perfectly willing to resort to rolling blackouts if things get out of hand, and has done so.  You're right that some people will be stubborn about it, just like some people are stubborn about quitting smoking.  We're a consumer-driven society in America, we consume to live.   The idea is that we start now, with relatively strict measures, so we won't face harsher crises in the future.

Yes, I suppose if you don't give people a choice, then their objection doesn't matter.  But the same can be said about NIMBYism.  Not really fair, in my opinion, to argue public opposition to one plan as being a fatal flaw, while in another something you simply ignore.


Yes, I understand that's the idea.  But I still don't feel that you've really backed up the premise sufficiently.  I don't think you've really made much of a case that future crises will be much worse than immediate (and permanent) "relatively strict measures."  You're basing your position on that premise, but it's not clear to me, one way or the other, that the one is better than the other.  I'm not opposed to what you're proposing, I just don't think you've made a good case for it yet.

Okay.  Let's start with the rolling blackouts in California some years back.  That's a good indication that we are on the verge of an energy crisis.  Skyrocketing oil prices is another.  That means we can outstrip our capacity right now, as opposed to "sometime in the future".  So, already we see that we need to slow down our energy usage at the present time, or face immediate crises.

I feel like maybe I'm not being clear, or perhaps you're not understanding what it is I'm asking for.  I can agree that we can't keep increasing our energy uses forever.  I agree that we will at some point reach a maximum of what we can produce.  I can agree that we may reach such a point numerous times, if our demand increases faster than our supply.  All that I can agree on.  No need to push that point any further.  Where I'm still not sure you've presented much of a case, is on the point of how bad it will be when we reach that point if just let the market deal with it, compared to how bad it will be if we enforce a shortage now (by limiting supply artificially) and for the indefinite future.


Not sure I'd agree with that entirely.  Not that I think your premise is wrong, per se, but more that I'm not sure that's good evidence of it.  The rolling blackouts also had a lot to do with people artificially restricting supply in order to jack up prices.  They were sort of an example of what you're saying is the cure to the problem (though done in a more underhanded manner than you're proposing).  Also, we survived those blackouts.  They weren't the end of the world.  If they're type of thing we're trying to avoid, I'm not sure that we need to panic.


But the fact that the price is going up is showing that market is already adjusting, without any need of outside influence.  As prices go up, people will use less, accomplishing what you're trying to do without any outside control.


Okay, so if "right now" is the problem we're trying to prevent that says two things to me:
1.  we don't need to panic, as we're already experiencing the shortage, and it's not killing us.
2.  it's too late for the "cure."

The only reason to do something painful right now is to avoid worse pain in the future.  But if it's already too late for that, I'm not seeing what your preventative measures are meant to prevent.  It has to be "sometime in the future" in order for there to even be such a thing as proactive remedy.


Okay, but again, that sounds like what markets are fairly good at doing.

And, again, if the crisis is RIGHT NOW", then what you're telling me is that "we need to cut back NOW so that we don't have to cut back NOW!"  You're not really preventing anything, or even changing anything.  Before I was looking for why one would be better than the other.  But now I'm more wondering how they're different at all.

That goes back to the smoking analogy.  If you assume that as bad as the crisis is now, it can only be worse in the future as the population rises and technology continues to assume an unending supply of energy, then we see that the very long term effects is a benefit.  That means the smoker's cough and other present minor health issues will cause less pain than the short-term effects of quitting a lethal habit.

So, does that mean the smoker should not quit smoking?  Of course not.  It means that you need to see beyond the short-term pain to the long-term benefits.

Think of our energy use as an addiction.  Once you're addicted, it's very hard to stop.  Even an artificial economic block won't stop addicts, they'll just get desperate.  Economics require relatively rational spending choices, and addiction robs you of rationality.


Going back to the rolling blackouts: if people would voluntarily reduce their energy usage by a total of X, there would have been no need for the blackouts, which were meant to cut energy usage by X.  So, instead of functioning along at, say, X-5 all day long, they ran at X+ for so many hours per day, and at 0 for the blackout period.  Presumably that is worse, in the long term, than an enforced overall reduction.

Okay, it sounding like you're just holding it as an assumption that "forced reduction in the future is worse than forced reduction now."  I can see that as being true in some case, and false in others.  IF it's true in this case, then I'd agree with you.  And I think it COULD be true that it's the case.  But it doesn't sound like you're questioning that it might not be at all.  That's where we seem to be getting hung up (and where anyone who doesn't share your assumption will get hung up).

Sometimes, as in the case of smoking, you can take a little pain now to avoid a lot of pain in the future.  In other cases, such as quitting your favorite healthy food because you're afraid they might stop making it someday, you may end up taking guaranteed pain now to avoid little or no pain in the future.  There's a spectrum of cases between the extremes.  You really haven't provided us evidence to show where this case in question is on that spectrum, you've just asserted that it's more like quitting smoking than quitting apples, say.

Actually, in the case of an addiction, it's a lot of pain now.  My roommate refuses to quit smoking, because he doesn't want to gain weight.  He's also over 400 lbs, so yes, while it's true that gaining weight would be bad for him, the long term benefits of quitting smoking are actually worth the pain if he were willing.

Anyway, yes, I am kinda assuming that we can increase our energy consumption faster than we can increase supply.  But then again, that's not hard.  Just imagine my home: just today, we had two different computers going at once, two fans and an AC unit (it's over 90 degrees outside!), three cellphones charging, on top of the usual appliances.  Add lights and a TV to this (we don't watch a lot of TV here, but other homes do) and add the DVD players and stereos instead of the extra computers, it's hard to see how energy consumption is going down.  And that's not even adding in extra kitchen appliances, washer/dryer, water heater, and the like.  The point is, we can easily increase our demand for energy in a heartbeat.  Decrease it, not so much.

Er, doesn't really sounds like my point it getting across, so I'm going to have to bow out of this one I think.

Bump for discussion in the OOC thread.

Moving the discussion here from the OOC thread so as not to clog it up.

Anyway, sounds like you're in the "okay, sure it's warming, but it's not our fault, and we can't do anything about it anyway" camp these days, Heath.  Out of curiosity, if it really was our doing, and we really could do something about it, do you feel we should?

Also, it sounds like you apply a somewhat one-sided approach to your appraisal of climate change.  Sort of an "if Al Gore makes some mistakes, the other side must be right" view.  But note that some of the complaints you made about Gore are true of those you're getting your info from (ie, a financial stake in what the governments decide to do about it, and the work is political rather than scientific).

I offered you a challenge a long time back, and I'd like to offer it again:  Mormon's say that if they pray for an answer to a question, they'll get it.  I would ask you to pray and ask what the cause of global warming is.  Before I think I had asked you to pray if it were real, but it seems you accept it is now, so I'm hoping you'll be more willing to give it a try now.

I would also echo Kathulos' comment that the daily mail isn't really a great source, and sort of undermines the credibility of what you're trying to say a bit.

Actually, let's start from the basics:
1.  Do you agree that CO2 has increased signficantly in the relatively recent past, and that this is largely due to human activity?
2.  Do you agree that CO2 is a greenhouse gas?
If we're going to discuss climate change, we should probably square those up first off.

A good summary, well put.


Yeah, would definitely be useful, but I doubt we'll see it.  We can't even get just the economic half of things as it stands (e.g., "if we spend $XT on stimulus, we'll get YM jobs"), and the climate question is way more complicated.  There's also the big issue that those spending the money are likely not going to be the ones who benefit from the result.  The people who are expected to get hit worst by the affects of climate change are in India and Africa, if I recall correctly.  Whereas the people who's behavior and decisions will have the most affect (ie, the people who'll have to pay to do anything about it) will be in the US, europe, and China.  Some places who have a non-trivial impact also stand to be better off because of it (Canada and Russia probably, for example).  Also, money spent to make changes would obviously end up going to someone, so even in just the costs part of doing something about it, you'd have winners and losers.  Moving money from oil subsidies to renewables would obviously be more popular with people providing renewables than with people providing oil.

So it's not easy to decide how best to react to it, what to do, etc.  But accepting that it's actually happening and we're contributing to it would be an important first step.

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/TBA--LTonly.pdf

Came across the above paper today, and found a pretty good non-technical summary of the global warming issue (evidence for it, evidence for it being human-caused, and reasons for doing something about it).  The plots of CO2 and methane levels were particularly striking, I thought.