THE VINE APRIL 16, 2008
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Dave Roberts swings a lead pipe at Bush's absurd climate speech today. I'll second Dave in that there's no use pretending that Bush is trying to address global warming in any sort of serious way—he's just giving himself political cover should he have to veto a cap-and-trade bill. ("Oh I'm all for tackling carbon emissions, it's just that this bill violates all those principles I talked about...") This bit from his speech, in particular, deserves a prize for incoherence:
The wrong way is to jeopardize our energy and economic security by abandoning nuclear power and our Nation's huge reserves of coal. The right way is to promote more emission-free nuclear power and encourage the investments necessary to produce electricity from coal without releasing carbon into the air. ...
Second, the incentive should be technology-neutral because the government should not be picking winners and losers in this emerging market.
So the government shouldn't pick winners and losers, so long as coal and nuclear are winners. Nice. Also, how do you avoid "picking winners and losers" among clean-energy solutions if, like Bush, you're opposed to placing a price on carbon and letting the market sort things out for itself? The only other way to provide incentives for low-carbon energy is to fund those technologies directly—which involves either Congress or some other government agency deciding what to fund and why.
--Bradford Plumer
9 comments
It's Nuc-u-lar Powerer, Brad. Nuc-u-lar Powerer.
Does anyone really expect Bush to be coherent about a subject in which he has consistently shown to have no interest in for the last 8 years? His incoherency reflects the deep thought processes that he applies to every policy agenda that he has pushed.
The ironic part is that many of the private sector think tanks and pro-industry lobby groups use this exact line of incoherent logic to defend their subsidies by couching them as energy choices.
I count the days when this administration and all of their hack shills that have pervaded every level of government are kicked out and the next president (Democrat of course) pushes through a comprehensive energy bill that pushes the U.S. into the 21st century.
- singlespeed
April 16, 2008 at 3:47pm
Robert's devestating review is a great read. You have to hide behind the sofa when you read it, he's so angry.
I'm confused though? More government money and focus for Nukes? I though that was a good thing? Aren't nukes a big part of the solution?
- The Ignorant Populist
April 16, 2008 at 3:55pm
Yeah, nukes will play a role, though possibly a very small one—and they may not even be the most cost-effective solution at that. (See this earlier post.) Either way, giant nuke subsidies are inconsistent with a "no winners and losers" stance.
- Brad Plumer
April 16, 2008 at 4:00pm
Resource rich post Brad. I'll have to take some time with it.
- The Ignorant Populist
April 16, 2008 at 5:08pm
In what must have been an Earth Day-inspired foray into environmental flim-flammery (on par only with
- Anonymous
April 24, 2008 at 3:41pm
In what must have been an Earth Day-inspired foray into environmental flim-flammery (on par only with
- Anonymous
April 24, 2008 at 3:43pm
Over at Grist , Anna Fahey posts a persuasive set of facts and counterclaims geared at convincing those
- Anonymous
May 1, 2008 at 1:57am
Over at Grist , Anna Fahey posts a persuasive set of facts and counterclaims geared at convincing those
- Anonymous
May 1, 2008 at 10:34am
A while back, Brad noted a tension in conservative rhetoric on energy policy--they say they don't
- Anonymous
May 21, 2008 at 9:01pm