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Fossil Fuel Subsidies Dwarf Support For Renewables
TravisTR sends word of research from Bloomberg New Energy Finance which found that direct subsidies for renewable energy from governments worldwide totaled $43-46 billion in 2009, an amount vastly outstripped by the $557 billion in fossil fuel subsidies during 2008.
"The BNEF preliminary analysis suggests the US is the top country, as measured in dollars deployed, in providing direct subsidies for clean energy with an estimated $18.2bn spent in total in 2009. Approximately 40% of this went toward supporting the US biofuels sector with the rest going towards renewables. The federal stimulus program played a key role; its Treasury Department grant program alone provided $3.8bn in support for clean energy projects. China, the world leader in new wind installations in 2009 with 14GW, provided approximately $2bn in direct subsidies, according to the preliminary analysis. This figure is deceptive, however, as much crucial support for clean energy in the country comes in form of low-interest loans from state-owned banks. State-run power generators and grid companies have also been strongly encouraged by the government to tap their balance sheets in support of renewables."
The fossil fuel industry has a lobbing campaign that dwarfs that of renewable energy. 'nuf said.
To help the now-wealthy to become yet more wealthy, or help all of humanity to avert climate disaster and live in a cleaner environment? Hmmmm decisions, decisions ...
Here in ireland the refinery price for petrol is ~42c per litre. But with tax, transport, more tax and whatever the petrol station adds onto the price it costs 1.27e to 1.37e per litre.
There are 3 separate taxes on petrol - excise which is like a 'sin tax' is about 60c, VAT is just over 20c and a ~5c 'carbon tax'. Ethanol isn't subsidised but has a reduced excise tax.
So you probably wouldn't be paying all *that* much for it if you weren't being taxed to the hilt
It would be interesting to see how the fossil fuel subsidy number was calculated. Even assuming the calculation is accurate, I'm not sure I buy the argument that renewable energy would be more economically viable than fossil fuels if not for government intervention. The article ignores taxes on fossil fuels, which I'm sure would dwarf any subsidies.
They'll always tax everything they can. Or, do you think that if a renewable energy starts getting a dominant position it won't be heavily taxed?
The article gives almost no information about what the funding is used for other than: renewable good, fossil fuels bad. If you look at the current renewable power production in the US it is 7% of the total and coincidentally the total funding worldwide for renewable energy is roughly 7.5%. While you can argue about giving more funding to renewable energy, they article gives zero information about what the money is used for. The funding could have been used for implementing cleaner technology on existing power plants (oddly enough they won't disappear overnight no matter how much you want them to). Just this year the EPA passed Boiler MACT II which will require large capital costs to install additional environmental equipment.
If you want to make the largest impact possible to reduct emissions you can't neglect your current power grid.
This might be true, but if you compare it to which fraction of our total energy production is renewable, then renewables get relatively more fuel subsidies than the fossil fuels.
Please show me where I am being supportive of Obama in this post.
Being against neo-cons, does not mean that I am in favor of Obama or lefties. I oppose the neo-cons for their total disaster that they created. However, if you even read this post or others, you will see that I am also calling Obama/dems to task for their in ability to change things. Or their UNWILLINGNESS to do the right thing. ANd I separate the neo-cons (reagan and W minions) against the republicans (lincoln, goldwater, truman, etc).
But hey, cowards like you, do not see that. YOU are the problem.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Maybe off point, but with my wife we used to joke: if the color is green, it must be healthy.
Last year we went to a vineyard in France, where the owner explained he had not applied for the "Bio" label because he used modern selective fungicides, thus his soil is alive. The "Bio" use copper sulfide at such quantities as to completely eradicate the microbial life from their soils. I prefer not to think what they drink from their wells. As agricultural engineer I think this case of "Bio" is entirely harmful.
If you're a greenie, you'll like this rah-rah study. Maybe you need some re-energization.
However, if you're not, maybe you'd like to know exactly _how_ true numbers have been distorted:
Dollar-wise, the biggest distortion is to consider road maintenence and building as a subsidy. This is slippery, since the substantial fuel taxes were justified and accepted by the voters on the basis they would pay for roads. Most places, the road funds are in surplus and contribute to general revenue, not draw from it.
Another large item in the US, but totally unaccounted is the oxygenated gasoline regulations. In many areas, the (obsolete and ineffective) legal requirement is for gasoline to contain 2% oxygen, earlier met with MTBE (which doesn't biodecompose fast enough) and now met with ethanol. In addition to the $1.50/gal direct subsidy, this legal requirement puts a demand floor under deathanol. How much is it worth? Who knows, but probably a large fraction of the direct subsidy.
Accounting for electricity is tough -- renewables use the same grid, and so anything is common. But renewables have poor reliability characteristics, so regs like equal buy/sell price actually are an uncounted subsidy. They certainly require more standby generation.
Here is a pretty little graphics for American subsidies.
Now, here is where you can get the study.
What this shows is just 6 years. It does not show the money that was originally put into many of these programs. For example, Nuke had LOADS of R&D done by the feds. Still does. And it still needs more (hopefully this time, the feds will not stop the IFR project that has been quietly started at UIUC; GD kerry for pushing it and CLinton for not having enough backbone to say no). And Coal had LOADS of fed and state assistance to get started. Free land; loads of pollution with zero clean up (see pix of eastern aChina to get an idea of what some parts of America was like in the 60's).
Even now, the subsidy that is being calculated in the above study has NOTHING about the air, water, and ground pollution that is allowed. If burning coal and oil had to pay for their pollution in all these areas, then they would quickly run to the top in terms of costs. WELL OVER Solar PV (which today is the current king of costs).
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
So, do you think that you have more money to spend when you lend yourself money and then pay that money back to yourself with interest? I didn't think so.
Give credit to the Republican Congress as well. It's not like the previous (or subsequent) Democratic Congress has made any attempts to rein in expenditures. Not that I consider a less than $20 billion surplus in one year as making up for the ~$1.4 trillion net deficit for that eight year period.
Personally, I never give any President credit/blame for budget surpluses/deficits. The House and Senate, whether Republican or Democrat, deserve all the blame/credit for that. And if more Americans would remember that come polling time, we'd probably all be better off.
Note, in addition, that if the Congress runs up a couple trillion in debt in any two year period, but you vote YOUR congressmen back in because they voted against it, then you're doing the wrong thing too - strategic voting has always been part of politics ("I can't vote for your gun control measure unless it's absolutely required to make the measure pass, since my constituents would kick me out if I did. So I'll provide vote number 51 of 51, but if there are already 51, I'll vote no...."), and should never be discounted....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
What about elf support?