Per this article (with Audio). Between law suits and direct CO2 charges against coal pants the price of electricity is going to increase by default.
Best guess on the cost increase of electrical power? I’m paying .062/kwh and would expect it to go to .1 or higher for an average increase of $367 per year based on my current usage.
Yes, cap-and-trade will make unmodified coal power relatively more expensive. Perhaps the most expensive. That’s why he has proposed subsidies for low-income people.
Guess what. McCain supports the same plan!
You’ve nowhere to hide! Flee now!
Good.
Cheap isn’t necessarily best.
It is when the economy is tanking. But that’s not what I asked. what’s it going to cost you?
Well, I get very little of my power from coal - most is Nuke, with Natural Gas providing much of the rest. I already pay more than you, although I am on a time-of-day plan, so any load I can shift to off-hours is pretty cheap. I also pay a monthly premium for “green” power, whatever that means.
Still, there’s always some reason why we (the US) hasn’t forced coal-fired plants to clean up. If it wasn’t the “economy” it would be something else.
Oh, I thought that was a rhetorical question.
I think the electricity here (central WA) is all hydro-generated, so I don’t expect there to be any raising of the current .044 / kWh (price does not include the constant “basic charge”, nor city tax).
If you believe a rabid right-winger can really do the math well enough based on very skimpy info to come to such an extreme conclusion, well …
I’ve got no idea how much it will cost me, but I welcome it.
I wouldn’t be opposed to getting rid of fossil-fuel subsidies anyway. Let the market price shoot up, and investment in clean energy will start looking alot more attractive.
I’m pretty sure all my juice here in SW Chicago suburbia is coming from the Braidwood nuclear power plant.
So… nothing, in theory. In reality, I imagine Exelon is always looking for an excuse.
We had a nuclear power plant project in Ohio that would have served my area but it got shit-canned for a coal plant. The grid in my area was shifted away from my city to an older (but larger) coal plant which I’m sure is past the half-way point on it’s duty cycle. The difference was made up in peak-use generators (7 of them) which so far haven’t been fully utilized.
The problem here is that if you don’t want coal or oil, you have to invest in nuclear. “Clean” energy is jusy not going to be able to supply the bulk of our energy for quite a while if ever.
An economist would tell you that’s the right solution: put a pollution tax on, and then let the free market do the rest.
And the think is, it won’t cost us as a whole anything: the pollution tax on coal would go towards reducing other taxes (and/or subsidizing energy for low income people). Don’t you want to reduce taxes?
How is raising taxes on coal going to reduce taxes? Energy drives the cost of every other product. Solar and wind are not reliable which will require an additional power source to bridge the gap. In other words, to produce a consistent amount of energy, MORE green sources will have to be constructed to cover the inefficiencies or non-renewable sources will have to be added.
Energy is not some kind of intellectual commodity to be argued over. We need it.
It will probably cost me a lot less than you Magiver. I planned ahead and I get most of my power from 6700w worth of Solar Panels on my roof.
Meanwhile that extra price on older coal plants will help pay to get cleaner electricity up and running including clean coal plants.
In the long run this is good for Global Warming but also for Air Pollution that leads to higher medical bills throughout the country.
Even with tax funded rebates you’re paying more for electricity than I am. It takes years to reach a breakeven point.
And the air is fine where I live. Pollen is a far greater threat to health.
As for global warming, co2 can be scrubbed and used to feed algae which is then made into bio-diesel. We can replace our dependency on oil and raise fleet fuel economy at the same time.