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There are 7 Billion (roughly) people in the world, and the majority don't have Internet, phones, or power. If you are in doubt, look at the populations of India and China. The majority do not live in cities, but the sticks.

Only 16% lack access to electricity. The majority do have cell phones, that is not subscriptions which is at 7+ billion somewhere. Half the world is online, at least occasionally. Maybe you should update your prejudices?

P.S. It's actually easier to do power and communication than water supply and sewage. Sanitation is still pretty lacking in many parts of the world.

Sorry, but I have no faith in numbers from Wiki or the LCOE they cite, and further, they include TCO figures for wind/solar that are largely based on speculation and guesswork

Erhm.

he following data are from the Energy Information Administration's (EIA) Annual Energy Outlook released in 2015 (AEO2015). They are in dollars per megawatt-hour (2013 USD/MWh). These figures are estimates for plants going into service in 2020.[55] The LCOE below is calculated based off a 30-year recovery period using a real after tax weighted average cost of capital (WACC) of 6.1%. For carbon intensive technologies 3 percentage points are added to the WACC. (This is approximately equivalent fee of $15 per metric ton of carbon dioxide CO2)

Link to the report itself.
So, what, exactly is wrong with this? I mean, oil prices are subsidized by themselves by most oil producing countries.

EA estimates reveal that fossil-fuel subsidies are becoming increasingly concentrated in the major oil- and gas-exporting countries. The share of Middle East oil exporters, for example, in the world total has risen from 35% to 40% over the last four years. The main reason for this trend is that high oil prices over much of the period meant that they, as net oil exporters, did not have the same fiscal incentive to reform energy pricing as that in many other parts of the world. Instead, the rise in government revenues from oil exports allowed an increase in government spending, often on social support programmes, expanding infrastructure and subsidies to food and energy. Over the period 2009-2014, fossil-fuel subsidies for this group of countries have, on average, been equivalent to more than one-quarter of government expenditure.

Soi why would it be wrong to factor in the tax-breaks and susidies given to renewables, when the point of comparison in terms of fossil fuels is also heavily subsidized by producing nations and the environmental damage caused by oil/coal means that the true cost of using these fuels is in fact externalized because there's a delay between using fossil fuel's and seeing the effect of the usage in the climate and thus the global economy?

The inclusion of subsidies does not make the price comparisons invalid, it makes them more accurate. Unless you want to start to calculate the actual, unsubsidized cost of oil/coal as well.

Except clean energy doesn't get all of them as well. Many of these tax deductions are specific to fossil fuel companies as my links show - just like there are other incentives that are specific to clean energy. The point is, there are particular tax incentives available only to fossil fuel industries, and not to other industries. Can you show any evidence to the contrary?

If you don't think that forgiving billions of dollars of tax revenue from a specific industry counts as a subsidy to that industry (in that it lowers their cost of production), then perhaps you don't understand what subsidies are. There is zero difference between giving billions in taxpayer dollars to a company, and not taking the tax from them in the first place.

The real question is, why are fossil fuel companies being granted hundreds of billions of dollars in specific tax incentives at all? Subsidies are often given to desirable new industries to help them become competitive, but that's hardly the case with oil and coal.

You will see for gas and oil, there is a bit more than half century of oil and gas left in proven reserves. Yes, there is still new oil and gas to discover, however, these reserves are expensive, difficult, not energy efficient to exploit.

You manifestly don't believe that smoking is good for you so I assume you don't smoke tobacco.

Likewise you think that hydrocarbons will kill you, your offspring and the planet so I assume you don't use them either. Because let's face it the only way to stop hydrocarbons being used is to stop using them. No petrol or diesel, no plastic, no coal powered electricity, no copper or aluminium, no cement, no building materials. Nothing that comes from hydrocarbons.

Are you doing that? Are you setting a good example and encouraging everyone you know to follow it?

Craig King

Yes, I don't smoke tobacco. And I generally avoid sitting in confined spaces with tobacco smokers.

However, I don't believe hydrocarbons will kill me, my offspring, or the planet. I do think that atmospheric CO2 negatively impacts the climate and lowers all of our standards of living. And I think ocean acidification is bad. Furthermore, I don't think you should be subsidizing my price of hydrocarbons.[1] And if I choose to use hydrocarbons once the direct and indirect subsidies are removed, that should be my right -- that's how a well functioning free market works. People who don't drive cars shouldn't subsidize those who do. Government, through fossil fuel subsidies, shouldn't be "picking winners"

This isn't about "setting examples" but is about an off-balance sheet liability for the planet which will be a drag on productivity and standards of living for future generations.

[1] http://www.worldenergyoutlook....

Very little of the world without electricity? Did you poop that one out with your morning constitution?

http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org/electricity.asp

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_resources_and_consumption

http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=468814

IF you were not too lazy to to use google.com you would have known that your statement is flat out so wrong it makes you look like a fool.

And that is just covering places where people live. I can walk 5 minutes to a park that has no electricity. But I'd bring that up if I wanted to be ANAL.