|
In response to
"all the money in the world can't make CO2 not heat up the atmosphere -- nm"
by
pixitude
|
That's not what I'm saying. Cleaner energy costs more than dirty energy, and that's likely to remain true for the foreseeable future. People are going
Posted by
Roger More (aka RogerMore)
May 3 '12, 16:39
|
to have to pay more for their energy if we are going to get more of it from clean sources.
That would be immensely unpopular in the rich democracies, and also in emerging economies where people want a higher standard of living, and cheap energy from coal is an avenue towards that.
The other thing too is that we don't pay enough for the energy that we do use. If a factory pollutes, we expect the factory owner to take measures to minimise the pollution and pay for clean-up. But we don't have the same expectations for our own behaviour. If we choose to drive a car, we don't pay anything towards the impact our car has on the environment. We're essentially getting a free ride.
If we were forced to pay the cost through a carbon price - whether by a trading mechanism or a carbon tax - that would be extremely unpopular.
|