Here we go.. environmentalists again trying to stop American power generation

[dudehitscar]

Originally Posted by Nimrod's Son

I'm talking about business. What you'll get instead is companies who wanted to build new power sources just saying "fuck it" rather than focusing on different technologies. That's what happens with negative reinforcement controlling a marketplace. Companies invest their dollars and resources elsewhere.

are you saying that because people won't be able to make money off dirty power they will somehow abstain from making money from energy production??

[topleybird]

And could people making sweeping arguments about what happens in the marketplace provide some examples rather than relying on people to share their opinion on how these hypothetical situations might play out?

[ryan patrick]

remember when we didn't impose higher fuel efficiency standards for cars on the auto industry because it would cripple them and now they're doing great?

[Ever]

Originally Posted by Nimrod's Son

Wouldn't it be better to add incentives for clean power rather than punish others?

Well the way I see it is like this:

Lets say Company A and Company B are in direct competition and each earn a revenue of $10,000,000. Whether you give Company A a $600,000 subsidy or whether you take $600,000 away from Company B, it hurts Company B all the same. The worst that can happen is a tax/subsidy system which essentially takes money from B and gives it to A. This hurts B the most.

My position here is for less (and ideally no) government intervention in the energy industry. The case for the private arbitration system was not to punish people for producing cheap energy, rather it was to punish people who vandalize others' property by polluting. I'm not talking about a few parts per billion of some insubstantial particle in the air or endangering a species no one really owns or anything like that. I'm talking more like the chemical plant that dumps corrosive solvents into a water stream which ends up damaging the local fishing industry's facilities and boats. Or the farmer who irresponsibly weakens the soil on some highland causing landslides in a nearby town. Here there is a legitimate need to punish those responsible for the damages on others' property, usually through payment.

What this would do, I think, is make the energy producers that actually cause damage less profitable and the ones that don't more profitable. I would imagine that environmentalists would have a hard time proving that most power plants actually cause any damages at all, so the energy industry would hardly be as "punished" as it would be under a stupid trade and cap scheme which doesn't handle cases individually and treats everything by numbers and paperwork. It might result in a push for "clean" power, it might not. But if it does it would be because there is a legitimate case for clean energy, whose expense would be compensated by the alleviation of damages caused to other sectors of the economy by the so called dirty energy.

There was also mention of the dependence on unstable foreign countries. Well my view here is that if the government wasn't silly enough to listen to crackpot environmentalists in the 60s the US would be almost completely nuclear powered and the only foreign nation it would have to rely on is reliable Australia for uranium.

[Ever]

Originally Posted by dudehitscar

are you saying that because people won't be able to make money off dirty power they will somehow abstain from making money from energy production??

If you put a 95% tax on oranges produced outdoors in farms but not those indoors in some kind of expensive to maintain hydroponic powered orange factory (read dirty energy vs "clean" energy) you'll see a lot less oranges in the hands of regular people and more of them next to the caviar plate.

Still less oranges altogether and certainly no oranges produced outdoors. Maybe more bananas (read some other industry not related to energy) since they only have a 5% tax across the board in this hypothetical.

[Caine Walker]

oranges next to caviar.

that's just silly!

[<sp3]

Originally Posted by Ever

There was also mention of the dependence on unstable foreign countries. Well my view here is that if the government wasn't silly enough to listen to crackpot environmentalists in the 60s the US would be almost completely nuclear powered and the only foreign nation it would have to rely on is reliable Australia for uranium.

well i certainly agree with this. If the nuclear industry got the jump start it deserved 30-40 years ago, not only would this whole middle east oil thing be a non-issue, but we would also have 30-40 years worth of modernization and development put into our technology to make them cleaner and cheaper then ever before. Think of how far things moved between 1945 - 1960.. and that was only 15 years. Every commercial nuclear reactor in this country (and the world except for two) are effectively 1960's designs. Technologies are being developed, some already in existence that would allow us to burn natural, un-enriched uranium, and burn over 90% of it without fuel recycling. Translation: significantly less waste, significant more safety, significantly lest cost. And thats only one example. These technologies could have been in place already if they had had the industry to support them all along.

A comparatively negligible amount of nuclear waste vs. how many millions of kilo-tons of pollution from burning fossil fuel for 3 or 4 decades? Good job, stupid hippies.

[Ever]

One thing I didn't know about the whole nuclear thing was that the spent fuel and radioactive materials were being bought up by certain chemical and materials manufacturers till jimmy carter declared the selling of waste a national security issue with the fear that a terrorist could somehow make an atom bomb out of it.

[<sp3]

Originally Posted by Ever

One thing I didn't know about the whole nuclear thing was that the spent fuel and radioactive materials were being bought up by certain chemical and materials manufacturers till jimmy carter declared the selling of waste a national security issue with the fear that a terrorist could somehow make an atom bomb out of it.

yea, and that was probably a good idea. You don't want anyone with a couple of million dollars to be able to get their hands on the stuff.. but i just cant argue with people enough to change the group-think mentality. All the nuclear waste in the world doesn't even come close to what is generated by burning fossil fuel, and in spite of its flaws, nuclear power is still the cleanest, safest energy source mankind has ever known

[Debaser]

I think this meme of blaming environmentalists and hippies for the lack of nuclear power plants in this country is a bit baseless. For one thing, environmentalists did not cause chernobyl and three-mile island (though, of course they duly used these events to spread the fear of it, unfairly or not).

The overriding reason that nobody is building new nuclear plants here is simply economics. Just like other clean(er) technology, nuclear plants are extremely expensive to build in the first place. Combined with this upfront cost is also the backend cost of storing and constant monitoring of nuclear waste. This simply makes nuclear electricity more expensive than coal or natural gas electricity. In a free market, if you want to make money, then you would want to build a coal plant, not a nuclear plant.

[Nimrod's Son]

Originally Posted by sp3

nuclear power is still the cleanest, safest energy source mankind has ever known

http://tdaait.files.wordpress.com/20...lar-panels.jpg
http://blogs.townonline.com/parkwayB..._turbine-1.jpg
http://plaza.ufl.edu/cjk11/Webpage/hydro.jpg

[dudehitscar]

Originally Posted by Nimrod's Son

http://tdaait.files.wordpress.com/20...lar-panels.jpg
http://blogs.townonline.com/parkwayB..._turbine-1.jpg
http://plaza.ufl.edu/cjk11/Webpage/hydro.jpg

thanks for correcting him Nimrod.

[sppunk]

Gee, here's a silly solution:

FORCE THE FUCKHEADS IN NEBRASKA TO LIVE WITH THE FACT WE'RE GOING TO BUILD A REFINERY NEAR THEM. That alone will help buy a nice chunk of time while hydrogen power is developed to be an everyday commodity.

I fucking hate NIMBYs. I also hate idiots who say ethanol is the end-all answer - it can't be farther from the truth.

[Gish08]

Ethanol is a dead end.

[<sp3]

Originally Posted by Nimrod's Son

http://tdaait.files.wordpress.com/20...lar-panels.jpg
http://blogs.townonline.com/parkwayB..._turbine-1.jpg
http://plaza.ufl.edu/cjk11/Webpage/hydro.jpg

Sorry, you are right.. i need to amend that.

What i meant was cleanest safest mankind has ever known that would be reasonable to apply on a scale large enough to fuel the entire continental united states.

yet...

[<sp3]

Originally Posted by Debaser

I think this meme of blaming environmentalists and hippies for the lack of nuclear power plants in this country is a bit baseless. For one thing, environmentalists did not cause chernobyl and three-mile island (though, of course they duly used these events to spread the fear of it, unfairly or not).

The overriding reason that nobody is building new nuclear plants here is simply economics. Just like other clean(er) technology, nuclear plants are extremely expensive to build in the first place. Combined with this upfront cost is also the backend cost of storing and constant monitoring of nuclear waste. This simply makes nuclear electricity more expensive than coal or natural gas electricity. In a free market, if you want to make money, then you would want to build a coal plant, not a nuclear plant.

true that nuclear energy is very expensive in upfront cost. But i understand how the nuclear industry works, and can say with a lot of personal experience from what i have seen with my own eyes that that the majority of those ballooned costs stem directly from ridiculous regulations and absurd amounts of wasted money spent trying to meet those regulation requirements. The regulations are illogical, and stem from policy makers who do not understand what they are regulating.

Once you have a nuke plant up and running, its operational costs, and cost per kilowatt-hour produced are vastly cheaper than every other source of energy.. except hydro electric. But you cant build a hyrdo damn everywhere in america. Nuke power, on average, is 5 times cheaper than wind in both upfront, and operational costs.




and believe me, i am no nuke fanboy or anything.. i am personally motivated by the desire to really find the best solution in all of this.

[Ever]

Originally Posted by Debaser

The overriding reason that nobody is building new nuclear plants here is simply economics... nuclear electricity [is] more expensive than coal or natural gas electricity... In a free market, if you want to make money, then you would want to build a coal plant, not a nuclear plant.

I wish the reason were economics in a free-market, there would be no problem if that were the case. However as it stands now the reason is anything BUT economics and there's certainly no free market in energy.

The energy market, and especially the nuclear energy market has been under strict government regulation since the Price-Andersen act of 1957. Under this act government stepped in to provide subsidized insurance for energy firms constructing or operating nuclear power plants. The act was meant to be temporary measure to kick start an ailing industry amidst fears that the Soviet machine was beating the free west in power generation, but instead this regulation has lasted 51 years now and is about to last another 17. As of 2005 Congress extended the act to 2025. In the 2005 copy of the document, energy firms are liable for only $400,000,000 worth of damages. Everything over this amount the government will provide. What this achieves, as all insurance achieves, is a moral hazard. There is no reason for a nuclear firm to invest any money in safety measures for risks where the damages are calculated to amount to over $400,000,000. In practice what this means is the market force (i.e a risk of losing everything) that would move firms to innovate technology and create safer reactors is removed by a government safety net.

In the 60s the push for nuclear power became even greater as many environmentalist groups started warning of global cooling. The culprit was said to be large smoke stacks from the coal plants and nuclear power was deemed the savior.

However come the 70s a large amount of money began to flow from oil companies to foundations like the Sierra club and all of a sudden public opinion of Nuclear power changed completely. President Carter ensured that nuclear waste disposal would forever onwards be a costly and hazardous errand.

Since then the nuclear industry has been subject to stupid and senseless regulation by the NRC (nuclear regulatory committee). If it was deemed safe to use one kind of component in a reactor made in 1948 no newer, more safe or more efficient component is allowed to be used today. This eliminates any incentive to invest in newer and better technology as firms know they're just gonna end up forced into using what's worse. It stifles growth and it ensures that what caould very well have been profitable and competitive stays unprofitable and uncompetitive. It increases cost and raises the price of energy for all consumers. Mr. Brown who mighthave been able to pay $0.02/kilowatt from Mr. Green and Son Nuclear Power Co. now has to pay $0.04/kilowatt from Mr. Smith's Oil Ltd. The lack of common sense found in all government regulation and bureaucracy continues. NRC regulations fail to properly assess risk. For the NRC a 0.000005% chance of a meltdown in some kind of desolate salt lake in Nevada is as dangerous as a 0.000005% chance of a meltdown in Manhattan. However if these sorts of calculations and risk analyses were left to private insurers whose existence depends on how well they do them, there would be no such silly oversights.

Not being part of the industry I doubt I can explain much of the regulations in depth but I'm sure sp3 might have some insight.

Debaser, you said the reason we don't have nuclear power is because of the free-market and economics. This is impossible for you or me or anyone else to know because we have not had a free-market in energy by any means for a long time. In the specific case of nuclear power we have had government legislation both provide incentives for warrantless risk and stifle technological development, effectively crippling the industry and distorting the market enough to make no such claim of yours plausible. I am of the belief that under the circumstances of no regulation and strong respect and enforcement, by private means, of private property, the nuclear power industry would blossom. However I would never assert this with certainty, and neither is my call for ending regulation made only to see nuclear power bloom. Rather it is to see the firms who can produce energy the cheapest and satisfy their consumers the most come out on top.

The way to solve the energy problem is not government punishing those who can produce energy cheaply (read oil companies/coal) by printing their failing competitors (read nuclear/green) money for no reason. Nor is it by stifling innovation, growth and technological advancement through senseless bureaucracy, and it definiteley isn't by promoting some crazy, senseless, reasonless agenda of stopping greenhouse gas emissions through a trade and cap system which does almost next to nothing to address the real problems of polution but does everything to destroy efficient energy producers and drive up the costs of living.

The solution is ending favoritism, ending this notion that the only way towards clean energy is to have government and energy producers scratch eachother's backs, ending all this pointless, stifling, silly and senseless paperwork and instead returning to the sound principles of private property and the free market.

[<sp3]

Originally Posted by Debaser

I think this meme of blaming environmentalists and hippies for the lack of nuclear power plants in this country is a bit baseless. For one thing, environmentalists did not cause chernobyl and three-mile island (though, of course they duly used these events to spread the fear of it, unfairly or not).

You are right in that they are not fully to blame. The people behind the chernobyl and TMI (engineers and operators) started everything and share part of the blame.. were it not for those two accidents then there would be nothing for the media and typical american to latch onto and blow out of proportion.

and i say that because there have been many more nuclear accidents, some a lot "worse".. that no one knows or cares about. The information is out there, the only difference is that there is no hype or spin associated with them. (research SL-1, Vladivostok Shipyard, or K-19) Those accidents are still amount to just about nothing when compared to the devastating effects of the coal industry for example. Just think about how many people have been killed in coal mines over the years vs how many people died as a direct result of Chernobyl. There is a large debate about just exactly how many people were harmed by chernobyl.. but the facility continued to operate until 2000, the radioactivity levels in the evacuated town nearby have essentially returned to natural background levels.. but that is a whole different argument.

The fact is that Chernobyl and TMI were bad, and the public has the right to be presented with the facts and come to their own conclusions. But my next and larger slice of blame goes to the minority of environmentalists and "hippy types" who put a spin on the story and distort the truth, leading people to have a misinformed opinion about the realities of nuclear power.

And my third and largest slice of the blame goes to the uninformed public. It is not their fault that they are uninformed, but they are. Anyone who understands even the very basic science of radiation and contamination would be able to objectively look at the facts of TMI and see that it was essentially a non-issue in terms of its effects on the population and environment around it, albeit an economic disaster. And anyone who understood the basics of reactor design could look at the chernobyl accident and realize that such an event could never happen to any american reactor.

so who's more the fool, the fool or the fool who follows him?

[<sp3]

and maybe its not my authority to hand out the blame.. but thats just the way i see it.

My point in this thread is that there are a lot of promising technologies on the horizon that all need further development. Geothermal energy looks very promising but is yet to be embraced on a large scale.. new nuclear technologies will change the mental image of large "dangerous" cooling towers that people have stuck in their head, and i hope to see cheap, easy to use wind generators and solar cells that people can use for their houses in my lifetime.

But i think that the EPA and other agencies like it focus too much on telling people "you can do that because it hurts the environment". They may be right, but what other alternative do we have? These people aren't supervillans plotting to destroy the world at all cost, they are economists and businessmen seeing it as the only viable solution that we have right now. These technologies need to be further developed. If the EPA did its part helping to perfect these technologies, they would bring the cost down to what could easily drive the dirties out of business.