After reading the article it is mentioned in the last paragraph that:
"Chibante and his research team are working with carbon-black maker Columbian Chemicals to identify a market for Atlantic Hydrogen's carbon, which has "very interesting carbon nanostructures that we just don't see from industrial production," he says. An early study shows that the material has a high surface area and thin chicken-wire structures called graphene stacks, making it potentially ideal in the production of high-performance batteries and ultracapacitors and for structurally reinforced products."
So this sound like it has additional benefits other than just reducing the total CO2 released by burning natural gas.
After reading the article it sounds like the potential tax might be more broad based. The article mentions taxing broadband connections and that the online advertising tax may hit newspapers and commercial broadcasters who advertise online. The article also mentions that the tax would be used to fund broadband roll out along with public TV.
After looking at the coloring book I was surprised to see that it came from Minnesota, hit look at the page 24. So apparently this is ok, but internet gambling is not.
As someone who has lived in this state and the twin cities area for my whole life (almost 30 years), I would like to provide one correction to your statement. A few years ago when we had the last budget shortfall the governor tried to strong arm the Native American casinos into paying state taxes, but because of the compact that was signed in the 80's (I believe 1986) the Native American casinos were exempted from state taxes for ever. So the tribes basically told Pawlenty to screw off. At this point there was the big push by the government to allow a private non Native American casino in the twin cities ares (near the Mall of America) at which point the tribe erroneously claimed that the compact that they signed gave them exclusive rights to casino gambling in the state, even though there wasn't any language like that in the compact.
Also a few years ago the Shakopee Mdewakanton Dakota had a disagreement with the city or Prior Lake since they weren't paying anything for road maintenance to the city even though the city was providing them services like plowing. The tribe refused to pay anything to help cover the cost of these services and the city threatened to make the roads leading into the reservation toll roads at which point the tribe acquiesced and started paying some for roads.
No its not. The only actual casinos with slot machines are the Native American casinos and they don't pay any state taxes. There is a horse racing track, and a harness racing track in the state that are private tax paying institutions, that are allowed to have some card games. In the report it was mentioned that they are loosing money. This is more likely a law that is being pushed by the race tracks and the Native American tribes to protect their business.
I do agree with what you are saying but here in Minnesota I doubt it is the government trying to protect its cash cow, since gambling is a somewhat contentious issue here. We have 2 legal private non Native American gambling establishments in the state, but a huge number of Native Amreican ones. The 2 private ones are the only ones that pay taxes and are claiming that they are loosing some customers to online gambling. These establishments are a horse track and a harness track that also happen to be allowed to offer card games.
The Native American casinos in the state do not pay any state taxes and because of the compact signed over 20 years ago (I believe it was 1986) that allowed these casinos will never have to pay taxes. A couple of years ago our governor tried to make them pay taxes when we had a budget shortfall and they basically told him to screw off. At the same time people were proposing creating a law that would allow a private casino in the twin cities area, and thus would be taxed. This was lobbied against by the Native American tribes in the area and they ran commercials against it claiming that the compact that they signed entitled them to exclusive casino gambling rights in the state, even though no such language exists in the compact.
So now add into the mix a state that is just about the biggest nanny state in the country that has legislators who will try to regulate, control, or ban everything and we get this. This will probably pass because it has powerful backers, the Native American tribes, the 2 tracks, and a legislature that likes to control everything. I have already bothered my state rep and senator and will probably get a patronizing auto response from my rep as he is a new democrat to the state house who is big into regulation.I am unsure what to expect from my state senator as he is a republican so may vote for the bill for moral reasons, but has in the past voted against more regulation.
Yeah, because free markets did such a good job with the banking industry.
The problem wasn't that the free market failed it was that it started to correct the problem (bad banks failing) and government stepped in and prevented the market from clearing (bad banks from filing for bankruptcy). Most people would have been unaffected by bank failures since there is the FDIC so the fear mongering that people would loose everything was bunk.
Where I work (the public sector) users need "training" even when they swap from one Windows XP machine to another, simply because it looks strange and different and their icons are gone.
Thus the problem with the public sector. But in all fairness I have seen similar things at a large insurance company in Portland, OR where my former company did work to replace their current system.
As you point out the bird kill is a non issue, older ones did, but not modern ones. That aside when I am hunting I do my best to solve the feral cat problem as does the rest of my party as feral cats do do a lot of damage to wild bird populations. There was even a debate in Wisconsin a couple of years ago about legally allowing hunters to shoot them. In Minnesota there isn't a season on feral cat nor are they a protected species so you are free to dispatch them.
This sounds great what we really need is to get as much power as possible. With cheep almost inexhaustible power lots of other problems go away. Along with developing wind I think all power generation is worthy of looking at like solar, hydro, geothermal, nuclear, and yes even fossil fuel. I say start building now. This would be a real stimulus that actually would provide a return on investment. The main problem is getting the political will to do so. I imagine that this will be much like the nuclear plant debate here in Minnesota where we have a law specifically banning nuclear plants and no political will to change it
Of course this topic will inevitably turn into the standard flame war of it's intermittent, you can't store electricity, and what not. But with the other smart grid technologies that are being discussed these things become less of a concern.
I would say that it is more that management of public infrastructure needs to realize that it should not be connected to the public internet. Unfortunately this won't happen because it is cheaper to have a worker be able to access their e-mail and a SCADA system from one computer than to have one for accessing SCADA and one for e-mail and all the other garbage the want.
As a libertarian leaning individual who happens to realize that carbon offsets are a possible solutions. I personally have a problem with how most carbon offset plans are implemented. They tend to be poorly implemented with very vague rules for what can generate a carbon credit/offset. Some of these offsets are simply not putting carbon into the atmosphere, or even worse not putting as much carbon into the air. I personally don't see how a windmill or solar panels remove carbon that could otherwise be pumped into the atmosphere. Granted the do prevent carbon from entering it, but no carbon was removed so how does this enable someone else to put additional carbon into the atmosphere.
The problem is that carbon offsets need to be administered globally and in a uniform way. The also need to be better verified since it seems like most don't do a good job of that. Since you can create carbon credits for turning really nasty greenhouse gases into not so nasty greenhouse gasses. Another thing that is allowed is carbon credits for not cutting trees, by not cutting them they may absorb additional C02, but their current absorption is already part of the baseline absorption so this shouldn't count either.
An example of what I am talking about is lets say you have a coal plant and last year you produced 10,000 tons of CO2 (just a fictitious number). Lets say that this year you sequester 5,000 tons of that CO2. Under most carbon schemes you now have a carbon credit of 5,000 tons since you prevented 5,000 tons of carbon from entering the atmosphere. You can now sell this credit to a subsidiary in a carbon market and then repurchase it. This allows you to claim that you produced no net carbon since you offset the 5,000 tons that was emitted. This setup isn't some straw man argument, but is entirely possible with current carbon credit schemes. Carbon offsets should only be granted for a net amount of CO2 removed not for preventing it from entering, and there should be a fixed amount of excess credits (how much can be emitted that doesn't need to be captured). This then would be a real market so long as there is some reasonable regulation ensuring that others follow the rules such as not having enough credits to emit what you did will result in a fine of X times the highest peak cost of credits in a given year. Thus buying credits would have been the better option.
Finally credits should not be treated as a tax as Gore is proposing, but should be an actual expense much as raw materials are. This is where most libertarians have an issue is that government wants to create something that generates more government income to waste.
The thing that worries me is the amount of information sharing, it seems that this is just ripe for abuse, data theft, data loss, and misinformation. I would love it if just my doctor had access to my medical records instead of everyone and their brother.
This sucks. Everyone wants the holding it up picture, why not get a unique picture. The best one I have is of Notre Dame de Paris at night with no one in the plaza. there are always people there, but it was a 4 to 5 minute exposure.
but not for the pros. When you move into the the medium format cameras you have things like this hasselblad which will give you 50 mega pixels. Their previous medium format digital camera had 36 mega pixels. Now granted these are ~$30,000 cameras new. Also keep in mind that these are also used for larger format prints rather than the 8"x10" picture that a regular consumer would produce. Also Hasselblad cameras have Ziess lenses which are about as good as you can get which is probably where the biggest improvements will be in cameras.
If this is similar to other self healing paint technology I would assume that the scratch or chip from something like a small rock or someone keying your car (not too badly though) would heal. Also like other similar technology I would assume that the healed area would still show signs, but would look better than those tubes of touch up paint that claim to match the color of your car that never do. You would probably notice it as being an uneven area in the paint if you looked closely.
This is correct as there are 2 methods for determining the octane rating. If you drive a European car that was made for the US you will usually see 2 octane numbers on the gas cap or cover. Each number has the name of the method used to calculate it. Also the pumps in the US specify the method that they use so just match the method name on the pump to the what is on the cap to figure out what octane rating is correct.
It's not hard to be smarter than the DHS. I think the jar of mayonnaise in my fridge is smarter than them. But that still doesn't make the statement false.
Slashdot Mirror
After reading the article it is mentioned in the last paragraph that:
"Chibante and his research team are working with carbon-black maker Columbian Chemicals to identify a market for Atlantic Hydrogen's carbon, which has "very interesting carbon nanostructures that we just don't see from industrial production," he says. An early study shows that the material has a high surface area and thin chicken-wire structures called graphene stacks, making it potentially ideal in the production of high-performance batteries and ultracapacitors and for structurally reinforced products."
So this sound like it has additional benefits other than just reducing the total CO2 released by burning natural gas.
This sounds a lot like the broken window fallacy. At best it is a net wash since those resources could have been better used for other purposes.
Or this trick: "1. Do you think we should discuss MS's trashing of ODF? 2. Do you think OOXML is a viable standard?"
Reply comes back as a single yes or no.
yes
After reading the article it sounds like the potential tax might be more broad based. The article mentions taxing broadband connections and that the online advertising tax may hit newspapers and commercial broadcasters who advertise online. The article also mentions that the tax would be used to fund broadband roll out along with public TV.
After looking at the coloring book I was surprised to see that it came from Minnesota, hit look at the page 24. So apparently this is ok, but internet gambling is not.
As someone who has lived in this state and the twin cities area for my whole life (almost 30 years), I would like to provide one correction to your statement. A few years ago when we had the last budget shortfall the governor tried to strong arm the Native American casinos into paying state taxes, but because of the compact that was signed in the 80's (I believe 1986) the Native American casinos were exempted from state taxes for ever. So the tribes basically told Pawlenty to screw off. At this point there was the big push by the government to allow a private non Native American casino in the twin cities ares (near the Mall of America) at which point the tribe erroneously claimed that the compact that they signed gave them exclusive rights to casino gambling in the state, even though there wasn't any language like that in the compact.
Also a few years ago the Shakopee Mdewakanton Dakota had a disagreement with the city or Prior Lake since they weren't paying anything for road maintenance to the city even though the city was providing them services like plowing. The tribe refused to pay anything to help cover the cost of these services and the city threatened to make the roads leading into the reservation toll roads at which point the tribe acquiesced and started paying some for roads.
No its not. The only actual casinos with slot machines are the Native American casinos and they don't pay any state taxes. There is a horse racing track, and a harness racing track in the state that are private tax paying institutions, that are allowed to have some card games. In the report it was mentioned that they are loosing money. This is more likely a law that is being pushed by the race tracks and the Native American tribes to protect their business.
I do agree with what you are saying but here in Minnesota I doubt it is the government trying to protect its cash cow, since gambling is a somewhat contentious issue here. We have 2 legal private non Native American gambling establishments in the state, but a huge number of Native Amreican ones. The 2 private ones are the only ones that pay taxes and are claiming that they are loosing some customers to online gambling. These establishments are a horse track and a harness track that also happen to be allowed to offer card games.
The Native American casinos in the state do not pay any state taxes and because of the compact signed over 20 years ago (I believe it was 1986) that allowed these casinos will never have to pay taxes. A couple of years ago our governor tried to make them pay taxes when we had a budget shortfall and they basically told him to screw off. At the same time people were proposing creating a law that would allow a private casino in the twin cities area, and thus would be taxed. This was lobbied against by the Native American tribes in the area and they ran commercials against it claiming that the compact that they signed entitled them to exclusive casino gambling rights in the state, even though no such language exists in the compact.
So now add into the mix a state that is just about the biggest nanny state in the country that has legislators who will try to regulate, control, or ban everything and we get this. This will probably pass because it has powerful backers, the Native American tribes, the 2 tracks, and a legislature that likes to control everything. I have already bothered my state rep and senator and will probably get a patronizing auto response from my rep as he is a new democrat to the state house who is big into regulation.I am unsure what to expect from my state senator as he is a republican so may vote for the bill for moral reasons, but has in the past voted against more regulation.
Yeah, because free markets did such a good job with the banking industry.
The problem wasn't that the free market failed it was that it started to correct the problem (bad banks failing) and government stepped in and prevented the market from clearing (bad banks from filing for bankruptcy). Most people would have been unaffected by bank failures since there is the FDIC so the fear mongering that people would loose everything was bunk.
Where I work (the public sector) users need "training" even when they swap from one Windows XP machine to another, simply because it looks strange and different and their icons are gone.
Thus the problem with the public sector. But in all fairness I have seen similar things at a large insurance company in Portland, OR where my former company did work to replace their current system.
Then imagine a beowulf cluster of power plants.
As you point out the bird kill is a non issue, older ones did, but not modern ones. That aside when I am hunting I do my best to solve the feral cat problem as does the rest of my party as feral cats do do a lot of damage to wild bird populations. There was even a debate in Wisconsin a couple of years ago about legally allowing hunters to shoot them. In Minnesota there isn't a season on feral cat nor are they a protected species so you are free to dispatch them.
Of course this topic will inevitably turn into the standard flame war of it's intermittent, you can't store electricity, and what not. But with the other smart grid technologies that are being discussed these things become less of a concern.
I would say that it is more that management of public infrastructure needs to realize that it should not be connected to the public internet. Unfortunately this won't happen because it is cheaper to have a worker be able to access their e-mail and a SCADA system from one computer than to have one for accessing SCADA and one for e-mail and all the other garbage the want.
The problem is that carbon offsets need to be administered globally and in a uniform way. The also need to be better verified since it seems like most don't do a good job of that. Since you can create carbon credits for turning really nasty greenhouse gases into not so nasty greenhouse gasses. Another thing that is allowed is carbon credits for not cutting trees, by not cutting them they may absorb additional C02, but their current absorption is already part of the baseline absorption so this shouldn't count either.
An example of what I am talking about is lets say you have a coal plant and last year you produced 10,000 tons of CO2 (just a fictitious number). Lets say that this year you sequester 5,000 tons of that CO2. Under most carbon schemes you now have a carbon credit of 5,000 tons since you prevented 5,000 tons of carbon from entering the atmosphere. You can now sell this credit to a subsidiary in a carbon market and then repurchase it. This allows you to claim that you produced no net carbon since you offset the 5,000 tons that was emitted. This setup isn't some straw man argument, but is entirely possible with current carbon credit schemes. Carbon offsets should only be granted for a net amount of CO2 removed not for preventing it from entering, and there should be a fixed amount of excess credits (how much can be emitted that doesn't need to be captured). This then would be a real market so long as there is some reasonable regulation ensuring that others follow the rules such as not having enough credits to emit what you did will result in a fine of X times the highest peak cost of credits in a given year. Thus buying credits would have been the better option.
Finally credits should not be treated as a tax as Gore is proposing, but should be an actual expense much as raw materials are. This is where most libertarians have an issue is that government wants to create something that generates more government income to waste.
The thing that worries me is the amount of information sharing, it seems that this is just ripe for abuse, data theft, data loss, and misinformation. I would love it if just my doctor had access to my medical records instead of everyone and their brother.
This sucks. Everyone wants the holding it up picture, why not get a unique picture. The best one I have is of Notre Dame de Paris at night with no one in the plaza. there are always people there, but it was a 4 to 5 minute exposure.
but not for the pros. When you move into the the medium format cameras you have things like this hasselblad which will give you 50 mega pixels. Their previous medium format digital camera had 36 mega pixels. Now granted these are ~$30,000 cameras new. Also keep in mind that these are also used for larger format prints rather than the 8"x10" picture that a regular consumer would produce. Also Hasselblad cameras have Ziess lenses which are about as good as you can get which is probably where the biggest improvements will be in cameras.
If this is similar to other self healing paint technology I would assume that the scratch or chip from something like a small rock or someone keying your car (not too badly though) would heal. Also like other similar technology I would assume that the healed area would still show signs, but would look better than those tubes of touch up paint that claim to match the color of your car that never do. You would probably notice it as being an uneven area in the paint if you looked closely.
This is correct as there are 2 methods for determining the octane rating. If you drive a European car that was made for the US you will usually see 2 octane numbers on the gas cap or cover. Each number has the name of the method used to calculate it. Also the pumps in the US specify the method that they use so just match the method name on the pump to the what is on the cap to figure out what octane rating is correct.
It's not hard to be smarter than the DHS. I think the jar of mayonnaise in my fridge is smarter than them. But that still doesn't make the statement false.