- Investing in alternatives has led to massive new industry that is improving the economy of those countries that do it. If your argument is an economic one then jump onto the solar, wind and battery bandwagon.
- There are virtually no real short medium or long term gains economically here. Gas is the only thing still competitive with solar/wind and its costs are rising while solar and wind continue to fall. Building new maximum pollution plants would drop that internalized cost but who in their right mind would fund something so obviously DOA?
- Obviously the externalized costs of greenhouse gas emissions are deeply undervalued in this move. Even if they are 'fake news' in the US, the rest of the world is finally starting to take them seriously. The US's diminished soft power means it won't be able to easily bully the world into allowing it to pollute without consequence and such an obviously hostile move means it will loose even more of its soft power by taking this position. So on the international level this means we burn a lot of political capital and gain nothing but decades of distrust and anger.
- Current events show that energy security is dominated by decoupling from fossil fuels. This weakens the US strategically and continues to set it up to be manipulated by exceptionally hostile actors.
- Oh yeah and, of course, climate change is real.
This continues the US down the path of being the best buggy whip maker in the world. Worse than that, the US is becoming an obnoxious buggy whip maker who's neighbors are starting to hope fails horribly and will help make that happen as moves like this continue. This is stupid at every scale and in every dimension.
The current wars in Europe and the Middle East paradoxically push the world towards non-fossil enery like few things did before. Both oil and natural gas prices have skyrocketed on global markets, and will likely rise more, as Ukraine continues to target Russian oil infrastructure, and Houtis continue to stymie Saudi oil exports.
Nothing hampers solar, wind, and batteries though; at worst it takes longer to ship the key components from China to Europe around Africa.
It's fun watching the right wing try to square this circle. Especially in the UK where we import most of our fossil fuels.
We could have sovereign control over our energy supply with renewables and electrification. Yay, we become a great sovereign nation free to do whatever we want with our great British energy supply!
But no, the right wing answer is to develop a couple of gas fields in the north sea that would supply a tiny amount of actual energy requirements, and do nothing for prices as it all goes into a global trading platform.
I know the reason, it's hard to say no to all that money from the fossil industry, and walk back decades of indoctrinating your base at their behest. Even if it means making your country energy independent...
jmward01 · · focus · HN ↗
- Investing in alternatives has led to massive new industry that is improving the economy of those countries that do it. If your argument is an economic one then jump onto the solar, wind and battery bandwagon.
- There are virtually no real short medium or long term gains economically here. Gas is the only thing still competitive with solar/wind and its costs are rising while solar and wind continue to fall. Building new maximum pollution plants would drop that internalized cost but who in their right mind would fund something so obviously DOA?
- Obviously the externalized costs of greenhouse gas emissions are deeply undervalued in this move. Even if they are 'fake news' in the US, the rest of the world is finally starting to take them seriously. The US's diminished soft power means it won't be able to easily bully the world into allowing it to pollute without consequence and such an obviously hostile move means it will loose even more of its soft power by taking this position. So on the international level this means we burn a lot of political capital and gain nothing but decades of distrust and anger.
- Current events show that energy security is dominated by decoupling from fossil fuels. This weakens the US strategically and continues to set it up to be manipulated by exceptionally hostile actors.
- Oh yeah and, of course, climate change is real.
This continues the US down the path of being the best buggy whip maker in the world. Worse than that, the US is becoming an obnoxious buggy whip maker who's neighbors are starting to hope fails horribly and will help make that happen as moves like this continue. This is stupid at every scale and in every dimension.
nine_k · · focus · HN ↗
Nothing hampers solar, wind, and batteries though; at worst it takes longer to ship the key components from China to Europe around Africa.
phatfish · · focus · HN ↗
We could have sovereign control over our energy supply with renewables and electrification. Yay, we become a great sovereign nation free to do whatever we want with our great British energy supply!
But no, the right wing answer is to develop a couple of gas fields in the north sea that would supply a tiny amount of actual energy requirements, and do nothing for prices as it all goes into a global trading platform.
I know the reason, it's hard to say no to all that money from the fossil industry, and walk back decades of indoctrinating your base at their behest. Even if it means making your country energy independent...
rightnutwingjob · · focus · HN ↗
No, you could not.