# A Workable 'Green' Policy **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 14, 2019, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560 "2019-02-14T22:41:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/21 "2019-02-15T23:42:57Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Leave partisanship at the door. Forget about old grudges, ‘gotcha’ posts, snarking about which side is worst, etc. For the purposes of actually accomplishing something, Imagine we’re a bunch of explorers which just landed on a planet locked in bitter rivalries, but none of us have a dog in that hunt, so the partisanship is meaningless. That doesn’t mean that left vs right thinking shouldn’t be involved, just that it should be fact-based and ideas offered in good faith. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > The other thing the right is leery about is that the left is trying to use global warming as a ‘crisis’ they can use to force a lot of standard left-wing policies that have nothing at all to do with global warming. The Green New Deal probably set back support of global warming policy on the right by a good margin, because it validated everything they feared. People fighting for global warming should be furious about that. But don’t blame just the Republicans. You can also blame people on the left trying to shoehorn policies that are anathema to the right into global warming deals that need the support of the right to succeed. And we’re done here. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/22 "2019-02-15T23:48:13Z")
> [@PastTense](#): > > The U.S. has about 4% of the world’s population but about 15% of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions; thus the U.S. is polluting close to four times its fair share. Thus the U.S. has a moral obligation to cut its emissions to no more than 4% of the world’s–and since the U.S. is a rich country it should do substantially better than that. Does the U.S. provide more than 4% of the world’s goods and services? Going by population count is meaningless in a globalized world. For example, South Korea has a huge steel industry. Steel is incredibly energy intensive. But lots of their steel is exported. So who should get the blame for that energy? South Korea? Or the people using the products South Korea makes? Let’s say the U.S. has 15% of the world’s CO2 emissions, but provides 20% of the goods sold in global export markets. Does the U.S. still look like the bad guy? > [@](#): > > No, it does not reduce the need for action from everyone else since even if the U.S. were to go to 0% but the rest of the world doesn’t take action it would only delay catastrophe for a relatively few years. So are we then focusing on the U.S. just for moral reasons or out of self-flagellation? Or do we actually want to do something about climate change? ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/23 "2019-02-15T23:53:33Z")
> [@Dale\_Sams](#): > > I just want to add: Make serious visible effort to give ‘reparations’ to coal miners. Make it so we can see that such things can be done. And by that I mean retrain them, pay the out of work ones, pay the relatives of out of work miners. etc…sure there will be abuse but thats true of anything. > > One big problem to overcome in any serious ‘new deal’ to work: the first step is get past the stigma of Socialism. That’s a huge hurdle cause the term is so politicized. > > Oh and in a perfect world screw a carbon tax. Take the GD money out of the insane military budget… I am not sure reparations to coal miners is needed. Even if we decided, tomorrow, to go 100% green with wind and solar and whatnot coal does not just disappear. Coal plants are out there and it would take decades to replace them with alternatives. Basically the coal miners get phased out. The people with jobs keep their jobs but no new workforce are hired. In time it will all be phased out. Consider when automatic elevators became a thing. We did not have elevator operator re-training programs. The elevator operators kept working and new buildings just did not hire operators as they installed more modern systems. That said if there is deemed to be some need for re-training then sure…if it makes sense do it. As to the overall proposal the only proposal I have seen that remotely looks like it would work is a cap-and-trade system. A cap on emissions is set then industries can buy and trade carbon credits. A market solution which, if done right, should balance itself. The problem with all of this is the same problem OPEC has. It is all well and good to set targets to maximize profits but it is almost impossible to force other countries to agree (or even if they agree to not cheat). There would be a huge incentive for poor countries to tell the US to piss off and let industry come in and pollute to their heart’s content. It is also almost impossible to tell poor countries to get with the program and not pollute. They will, rightly, point out that the rich countries polluted like maniacs and got rich and now they are telling the poor countries to not try the same thing and stay poor? They will give the US the finger and do whatever is in their best interests. Which kinda means we are all screwed. We will not, cannot, stop this race to the bottom. At least I cannot see how it will work. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2019, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/24 "2019-02-15T23:55:56Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > And we’re done here. I wasn’t trying to bash the left, but explain how the inclusion of non-climate change left-wing policies is a bad idea. I would say the same thing if the Republicans came up with a plan that also required Democrats to sign on to a giant wall around the country. The point isn’t to say one side is bad, but to say that piggybacking unrelated policy into climate change policy for partisan reasons is a bad idea. And I was saying this in the context of explaining why I believe carbon taxes need to be handled differently to get the right on board. We have your point of view anyway: You don’t know anything about the subject, but you like the idea of grand sweeping manifestos. Got it. Given that you don’t want to talk about actually implementing climate policy, that’s a better reason for leaving the thread. My response would be that if we’re not at the point yet of actually trying to figure out how to do this stuff, then the 10-year timetable for doing almost anything is a fantasy. I thought we were more serious about actually doing something about climate change quickly. Apparently not. Because a manifesto won’t generate a single watt of clean power, and the engineering challenges are daunting. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/25 "2019-02-16T00:01:30Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > I am not sure reparations to coal miners is needed. > > Even if we decided, tomorrow, to go 100% green with wind and solar and whatnot coal does not just disappear. Coal plants are out there and it would take decades to replace them with alternatives. > > Basically the coal miners get phased out. The people with jobs keep their jobs but no new workforce are hired. In time it will all be phased out. Consider when automatic elevators became a thing. We did not have elevator operator re-training programs. The elevator operators kept working and new buildings just did not hire operators as they installed more modern systems. > > That said if there is deemed to be some need for re-training then sure…if it makes sense do it. > > As to the overall proposal the only proposal I have seen that remotely looks like it would work is a cap-and-trade system. > > A cap on emissions is set then industries can buy and trade carbon credits. A market solution which, if done right, should balance itself. > > The problem with all of this is the same problem OPEC has. It is all well and good to set targets to maximize profits but it is almost impossible to force other countries to agree (or even if they agree to not cheat). There would be a huge incentive for poor countries to tell the US to piss off and let industry come in and pollute to their heart’s content. > > It is also almost impossible to tell poor countries to get with the program and not pollute. They will, rightly, point out that the rich countries polluted like maniacs and got rich and now they are telling the poor countries to not try the same thing and stay poor? They will give the US the finger and do whatever is in their best interests. > > Which kinda means we are all screwed. We will not, cannot, stop this race to the bottom. At least I cannot see how it will work. To get compliance, you have to make it in the country’s best interest. There are several ways to do that: 1. Come up with a better way to provide power to them 2. Offer them a subsidy for converting to green power 3. Make them an offer they can’t refuse #1 might include what I mentioned above - a large scale project to bring small modular reactors, wind power and solar power to various places, using whatever makes the most sense in each place. Call it foreign aid. #2 could simply be done by giving them money to not build coal plants, and they can use the money to import power or build clean plants. #3 would involve tariffs as soft power, or blockades as hard power. This path has the highest likelihood of leading to military conflict. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/26 "2019-02-16T00:02:50Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > To get compliance, you have to make it in the country’s best interest. There are several ways to do that: > > 1. Come up with a better way to provide power to them > 2. Offer them a subsidy for converting to green power > 3. Make them an offer they can’t refuse > > #1 might include what I mentioned above - a large scale project to bring small modular reactors, wind power and solar power to various places, using whatever makes the most sense in each place. Call it foreign aid. > > #2 could simply be done by giving them money to not build coal plants, and they can use the money to import power or build clean plants. > > #3 would involve tariffs as soft power, or blockades as hard power. This path has the highest likelihood of leading to military conflict. It is not just power generation though. It is allowing industries in your country to pollute. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/27 "2019-02-16T00:04:44Z")
> [@Ramira](#): > > Given the presque zero implementation of any actual such taxes and the ideological bolshevism in the North american right, I find this assertion ridiculous. > > Bon the façade of the discussion is revealed with the reasonging à l’Iraq. I leave you to the various sterile ideological exchanges entre north americans I have no idea what that last paragraph means. What does ‘reasoning à l’Iraq’ mean? And how did this become a ‘sterile ideological exchange’? ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/28 "2019-02-16T00:07:05Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > It is not just power generation though. > > It is allowing industries in your country to pollute. Do you mean with CO2? Or other pollutants like SO2? If so, I’d suggest that that’s a different problem, and a different debate. But, one of the solutions could also work for CO2 emissions: An expansive foreign aid, tied to compliance with emissions standards. Make the aid larger than the cost to reduce emissions, and you can induce change. Other than that, I got nothing unless we want to start using the U.S. military to force people do do the needful. And I don’t think anyone wants that. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/29 "2019-02-16T00:11:17Z")
> [@Dale\_Sams](#): > > I just want to add: Make serious visible effort to give ‘reparations’ to coal miners. Make it so we can see that such things can be done. And by that I mean retrain them, pay the out of work ones, pay the relatives of out of work miners. etc…sure there will be abuse but thats true of anything. This might be decent PR, but in terms of “who we want to bail out”, I think coal miners rank somewhere between “people who own beachfront property” and “people who lost their job for any reason whatsoever in the past few years”. > [@](#): > > Oh and in a perfect world screw a carbon tax. Take the GD money out of the insane military budget… The point of a carbon tax is not simply “raise money”. It’s also to reveal the hidden cost of carbon. If your gas costs 2 bucks a gallon, you’re essentially not paying for a _massive_ externality, and as a result, you’re going to burn more gas and be less interested in ways to burn less. Meanwhile, when you calculate the cost of global warming in (currently an externality that [absolutely nobody is paying for](https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/02/if-property-rights-were-real-climate-destroying-companies-would-be-sued-out-of-existence)), you’re looking at a far higher cost. It’s like… Imagine if every time you bought an apple, a third party to the transaction has a bucket of sludge dumped on their lawn that costs about a hundred bucks to clean up. If you never had to think about that problem, you’d probably gladly keep on buying apples for a buck a piece, because apples are delicious and a dollar for an apple is pretty nice. But in order to be fair, there’s no way around it - if you’re going to buy that apple, you need to pay for both the apple and the $100 in extra costs that occur as a result of your purchase. If you might end up buying considerably less apples… Well, shit, maybe you _should_ buy less apples in that case. And remember - this _is_, for all intents and purposes, the free-market solution. Taxes to correct externalities is about as close to “let the free market deal with it” as you can possibly get on this problem. There is no solution that’s somehow “more conservative” - that is as small-government as we get without simply wishing the problem didn’t exist. Do you understand why getting conservatives to give a shit is such a hard lift? Why basically every proposal (including carbon taxes!) get slagged off as “socialism”? ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/30 "2019-02-16T00:16:54Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Do you mean with CO2? Or other pollutants like SO2? Pollution in general is a problem but for this thread we are concerned with anthropogenic global warming and what we can do to stop it. While power plants are primary culprits industry can be too (e.g. steel mills). ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/31 "2019-02-16T00:27:09Z")
Sure. That’s one of the reasons why I think unilateral action is not going to work very well. What happens if the U.S. increases its cost of energy by eliminating fossil fuels? A) the cost of fossil fuels goes down everywhere else, stimulating demand and perhaps helping to move dirty industries to the worst places they could be, and B) the social cost of carbon goes down, which reduces the need for change even in countries that will be impacted by global warming. This is not an easy problem at all. The best answer would be to use an energy source even cheaper or better, which will force them to follow suit to stay competitive. The only one I know of that has the potential for doing that is nuclear power. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/32 "2019-02-16T00:39:12Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > This might be decent PR, but in terms of “who we want to bail out”, I think coal miners rank somewhere between “people who own beachfront property” and “people who lost their job for any reason whatsoever in the past few years”. Agreed. Lots of people lose jobs, and industries rise and fall. We don’t pay them reparations. Instead, we should have a general policy of worker assistance in cases of large-scale layoffs that can include job training, temporary financial help, relocation assistance, etc. > [@](#): > > And remember - this _is_, for all intents and purposes, the free-market solution. Taxes to correct externalities is about as close to “let the free market deal with it” as you can possibly get on this problem. There is no solution that’s somehow “more conservative” - that is as small-government as we get without simply wishing the problem didn’t exist. > > Do you understand why getting conservatives to give a shit is such a hard lift? Why basically every proposal (including carbon taxes!) get slagged off as “socialism”? That’s why governments have to be REALLY careful with carbon taxes, because people are suspicious of their motives. Our government promised a ‘revenue neutral’ carbon tax that would be used to fight global warming. Then they exempted a whole bunch of people from it for political reasons. Then they redefined ‘revenue neutral’ to mean that they would take in the revenue and spend it as general revenue, but since the money was being spent on behalf of Albertans, it was ‘revenue neutral’. That kind of logic makes ANY tax ‘revenue neutral’. That kind of bait-and-switch is what leads to cynicism about the true nature of the tax as just another scheme to put money in the hands of politicians to do with as they see fit. That’s also why I suggest that future ‘carbon taxes’ be more like airport levies - targeted at specific projects that can be monitored and quantified. “Trust us - we’ll spend it wisely” isn’t going to fly. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/33 "2019-02-16T00:41:43Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Sure. That’s one of the reasons why I think unilateral action is not going to work very well. What happens if the U.S. increases its cost of energy by eliminating fossil fuels? A) the cost of fossil fuels goes down everywhere else, stimulating demand and perhaps helping to move dirty industries to the worst places they could be, and B) the social cost of carbon goes down, which reduces the need for change even in countries that will be impacted by global warming. There is reason to believe green energy can be cheaper than fossil fuels. As technologies age they lower in cost. Nothing new there, happens in most industries. Consider the cost of mining a fossil fuel and then transporting it and then refining it and then transporting it again to building a windmill or solar panel. I know it is more complex than just that but there is good reason to think green energy can be cheaper in the end. > [@](#): > > **Renewable energy will be cheaper than fossil fuels by 2020, according to a new report** > > - A new report predicts the cost of renewable energy will drop significantly by 2020, making it less expensive than fossil fuels. > - Last year, solar and wind power accounted for nearly 95% of new energy in the US. > - Using renewable energy, instead of fossil fuels, is not only an environmentally conscious decision, but also an economical one. > > SOURCE: [Renewable Energy Will Be Cheaper Than Fossil Fuels by 2020](https://www.businessinsider.com/renewable-energy-will-be-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels-by-2020-2018-1) Indeed this is a big part of the answer. Let new, alternative energy industries grow. Stop subsidizing fossil fuels (or subsidize green energy the same way…level the playing field). The better solution will naturally prevail via market forces. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/34 "2019-02-16T00:54:45Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > There is reason to believe green energy can be cheaper than fossil fuels. As technologies age they lower in cost. Nothing new there, happens in most industries. > > Consider the cost of mining a fossil fuel and then transporting it and then refining it and then transporting it again to building a windmill or solar panel. I know it is more complex than just that but there is good reason to think green energy can be cheaper in the end. > > Indeed this is a big part of the answer. Let new, alternative energy industries grow. Stop subsidizing fossil fuels (or subsidize green energy the same way…level the playing field). The better solution will naturally prevail via market forces. It would be great if these things became cheaper than traditional power, becsuse then we wouldn’t have to do anything and the world would change over all on its own. But I am skeptical of ‘grid parity’ of renewable sources in general, when measured by cost at the point of delivery. But so far, every place I know of that has converted to solar and wind has done so at significant increases to delivered electricity costs. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/35 "2019-02-16T01:02:14Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > But so far, every place I know of that has converted to solar and wind has done so at significant increases to delivered electricity costs. There is an argument that higher energy costs begets more efficient practices: > [@](#): > > **In Germany, the Green New Deal Actually Works** > > For Germany, though, higher prices have been more of a blessing than a curse. They have helped transform Germany into the world’s most energy-efficient economy. It has also remained one of the world’s most competitive, in part because it adapted to higher energy costs. > > SOURCE: [In Germany, the Green New Deal Actually Works - Bloomberg](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-02-13/in-germany-the-green-new-deal-actually-works) ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/36 "2019-02-16T13:38:22Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > There is an argument that higher energy costs begets more efficient practices: Germany is set to [miss](https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-germany-emissions/)its climate goals both in 2020 and 2030. The reason is that it has rejected nuclear. “Shutting down nuclear plants is leaving Germany short of generation plants that can work on the breezeless dark days in winter when wind farms and solar plants won’t provide much to the grid—and demand is at its peak. Another problem: When it’s windy and bright, the grid is so flooded with power that prices in the wholesale market sometimes drop below zero.” If they had kept the percentage of nuclear as they did 20 years ago they would already be generating over 50% of electricity with no carbon emissions and coal would no longer be the top fuel. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/37 "2019-02-16T13:51:23Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > TThe usual solution for coordination problem is government style force to punish free riders and slackers. That won’t work in this case because it is obvious that no one is going to war with China or India over global warming or even stop trading with them. Attempts to have agreements without force such as the Paris Accords have been proven [worthless](https://unfccc.int/news/world-energy-system-not-on-track-to-meet-paris-agreement-goals). There’s an enormous difference between “worthless” and “not 100% effective.” Of course toothless agreements aren’t as good as toothy ones. Of course unilateral actions aren’t as good as multilateral ones. So what the United States needs to do is to become a leader and a bully in this area, as we’ve been for years in other areas of international diplomacy. Mitigating climate change is absolutely an issue of national security. We need to go back to the table of the Paris Accords, sign on enthusiastically, lead the world in reducing greenhouse gases. And then we need to predicate future trade deals on cooperation in this arena. Nations that continue to pollute get cut out of the best deals. Central to this approach is our leading the way. We cannot possibly demand more of other nations than we demand of ourselves. We need to make foreign aid available to nations that are willing to pollute less. But the idea that we won’t take serious measures until others do? That’s mutual suicide. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/38 "2019-02-16T13:59:10Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > A big problem is that unilateral action reduces the need for action from everyone else. The social cost of carbon without the U.S.'s contribution to the planet is lower than with it. In addition, if the U.S. adopts higher cost energy to mitigate climate change it will give countries with cheaper power a comparative advantage, which not only will attract more industry to the worst power sources, but will make it much harder to bring them into compliance since they would lose that advantage. > > Nuclear power can certainly be the answer here. We keep hearing how ‘expensive’ it is, but the proof is in the pudding - France gets 70% of its electricity from nuclear, and has some of the cheapest power in Europe. Sweden gets 40% of its power from Nuclear, and it also has below-average electricity prices. Ontario used to have lots of nuclear power, and they had very cheap power. Now they have lots more wind and solar, and their power prices are the most expensive in Canada. > > Not only that, but efficiency isn’t just about cheap power - it’s also about _reliable_ power. A grid that fluctuates or has rolling brownouts raises the costs of every business connected to it. > > A wholesale move to modern, safe nuclear reactors would result in a grid containing clean, stable, scalable power. And after the construction costs are amortized out, nuclear becomes by far the cheapest energy source around. > > Let’s talk about what could be done with nuclear power in the ten year time frame. Modern nuclear plants are designed to be constructed in about five years… These reactors cost between 3 and 5 billion dollars for 1,000 MW. > > If you spent the equivalent of the TAARP plan (780 billion), you could build maybe 150 such reactors, providing 150 GWe of power. If you used that money as loan guarantees or subsidies with substantial industry contribution, you could double or triple that. At a 93% duty cycle, which these modern plants are designed for, that’s 1,222,020 gWh of power per year, which could just about replace every coal plant in the country and reduce CO2 emissions by around 20% in maybe 5-10 years. > > Now there’s a plan I could get behind. Loan guarantees and subsidies for nuclear plants to the tune of $70 billion per year for 10 years, to be paid for by a carbon tax. The promise at the end of that is that the states who implement it will have the cheapest, most reliable power in the country. The problem I see with nuclear is first that it will take time. As we talked about in the GND thread infrastructure takes a long time to build in the US. One would think that since enviros think climate change is such an emergency that they would want to expedite solutions but we have seen that is not the case. Solutions that wish away opposition are not really solutions. Secondly nuclear is aimed at the part of the problem that seems likely to be solved in other ways. After thirty years of empty promises it seems like renewables are finally becoming cost competitive with fossil fuels, at least in some areas. Batteries such as the kind Tesla installed in Australia are providing some solution to the problem of slack times for solar and wind. Consequently the electricity and heat production sector’s percentage of overall carbon production has been going down slightly since 2012. Taken together it could mean that the investments in nuclear will have become obsolete by the time they are ready to be built. In contrast investments in carbon capture goals funded via carbon taxes could be ready more quickly if they are designed correctly and since they are sector agnostic they have no risk of being technologically obsolete and can target the entire sprectrum of carbon release. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/39 "2019-02-16T14:09:01Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > The problem I see with nuclear is first that it will take time. As we talked about in the GND thread infrastructure takes a long time to build in the US. One would think that since enviros think climate change is such an emergency that they would want to expedite solutions but we have seen that is not the case. Solutions that wish away opposition are not really solutions. Nuclear is way more complicated than this. New designs for nuclear facilities are, as near as I can tell, really safe. [Old designs weren’t nearly so safe](https://www.power-technology.com/features/featureageing-nuclear-plants-are-they-safe-by-todays-standards-4546033/). So the complications are: 1. Folks who grew up during the reign of old designs haven’t learned about the technical improvements (or are understandably skeptical, given misinformation from nuclear advocates in previous decades). These folks are an impediment to the introduction of clean nuclear energy. 2. There really are issues with the currently-operating, old plants–but the nuclear industry stands in the way of regulating these plants according to modern safety protocols, because doing so would be expensive. 3. New nuclear power, as puddleglum points out, would take a long time to get up and running even without angry activists. Despite these issues, I do think modern nuclear plants are part of the solution to climate change–and many environmental activists agree with me. But the complexities of the question are usually lost in polls and indeed in most discussions of nuclear energy. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2019, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560/40 "2019-02-16T14:24:38Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > There’s an enormous difference between “worthless” and “not 100% effective.” > > Of course toothless agreements aren’t as good as toothy ones. Of course unilateral actions aren’t as good as multilateral ones. So what the United States needs to do is to become a leader and a bully in this area, as we’ve been for years in other areas of international diplomacy. > > Mitigating climate change is absolutely an issue of national security. We need to go back to the table of the Paris Accords, sign on enthusiastically, lead the world in reducing greenhouse gases. And then we need to predicate future trade deals on cooperation in this arena. Nations that continue to pollute get cut out of the best deals. > > Central to this approach is our leading the way. We cannot possibly demand more of other nations than we demand of ourselves. We need to make foreign aid available to nations that are willing to pollute less. > > But the idea that we won’t take serious measures until others do? That’s mutual suicide. This it totally unrealistic. Of the 195 countries that signed on to the Paris accords [7](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2018/10/11/few-countries-are-meeting-paris-climate-goals-here-are-ones-that-are/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.9c1f7f7ae1d6)have taken action to achieve the goals. Is the US really going to bully the other 187 nations effectively? Take China the world’s largest carbon emitter. Exports to the US are 20% of the total exports and exports are 20% of their economy. So we could plausibly threaten to reduce their economy by 4% unless they take action that would reduce their economy by much more than that. Further, the idea that China would allow itself to be bullied by the US is risible. The whole CCP claim to power in China is that they are restoring China’s greatness after the century of humiliation. Allowing the US to bully them would be the last thing they would do. The US has been unsuccessfully trying to bully Iran out of its nuclear program for decades, and has been trying to bully Russia out of the Ukraine for 5 years with no sign of success. Yet somehow the US is going to acquire the secret of bullying and successfully do it to every country in the world? There is no chance at all that could possibly work. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-workable-green-policy/829560.md?page=3)