Rudewalrus:

The price of traditional energy is far more likely to increase, rather than decrease, making such things as wind a better bet.
...
If, as is likely, oil prices continue to rise,

I don't agree with your premise. As prices increase, supplies increase as well. The marketplace adjusts the price of oil (or other energy sources such as natural gas) over time. It has done so successfully for over 100 years. Here in New England new homes use natural gas instead of oil. New technologies allow for the drilling of oil in places where it was not possible 10 years ago. Ironically, the melting of the arctic has helped in this endeavor.

How do you convince yourself that it is different now so that oil prices rise rapidly above the rate of inflation? I think that your argument is predicated on oil prices increasing at greater than the rate of inflation whereas wind prices are increasing at less than the rate of inflation.

This economic argument is different than the global warming discussion; if global warming is an extreme problem, it is not solveable by traditional economics. But energy supply is solveable by the marketplace, or at least is has been since the industrial revolution.

hahaha, Obama has ZERO plans for coal. He may claim he is for it but his standards keep it out of bounds.
http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/46913

President Obama would like the country, and especially the coal producing states, to believe that coal is part of his “all-of-the-above” energy plan by adding ‘clean coal’ to the plan. But ‘clean coal’ according to a Clean Energy Standard requires 90 percent removal of its carbon dioxide emissions and the technology to do so is not commercially viable today and is not likely to be by 2035. Therefore, his plan would have us retire perfectly good coal generating capacity and replace it with more expensive natural gas, renewable, and nuclear generating capacity, while charging us 18 percent more to reduce our carbon dioxide emissions. U.S. carbon dioxide emissions reductions will be dwarfed by the increase in emissions from developing countries in their quest for better living conditions and greater economic growth, even as our own electricity prices skyrocket.

Yes, he says what you want to hear but he acts in another way, he does this an awful lot and people (like you) simply hear what they want and move on...

ray

This economic argument is different than the global warming discussion; if global warming is an extreme problem, it is not solveable by traditional economics. But energy supply is solveable by the marketplace, or at least is has been since the industrial revolution

This is largely true,
There was a very good documentary on the reaction to Hurricane Sandy on CNN yesterday. It included a look at the efforts to make New Orleans safe from another Katrina. And the probable costs of making New York/ New jersey safe from another Sandy....
The proposed surge barrier that could protect New York/ New jersey (based on technology developed and in use in the Netherlands and Russia) was $30 billion. About what its costing (with Senatorial additives) to rebuild from Sandy.
That's New York. Now figure in the rest of the coastal urban centres .....
That's the scope of the problem.

Denialists would have you believe against all evidence, that the atmosphere and the ocean are NOT warming, and that events like Sandy and Katrina will be once a decade events. (Even though they occurred in a shorter time frame) Then there are those who believe that it is possible to mitigate the warming. And reduce the frequency of very damaging weather events.
I don't really believe either, the second mostly because I think we've gone past the point where fossil fuels can be reduced quickly enough to where the increasing temperatures can be significantly affected. Not to say it isn't still worth a try, its just that I think there's no will, and perhaps too few options to be effective .. But I do believe that man kind will have to incur very costly infrastructure investments in order to continue living by the oceans.
Or very great costs to move the populations away from the coasts and the frequent damage.
If that revenue comes from a tax on fossil fuels that are contributing to the problem ... that would make sense....

As for the price of wind and solar powered electricity... I wouldn't bet against the long term wisdom of Buffett. He's already factored in the elimination of subsidies and sees a profit in the future despite...

And Tom "Clean Coal" is kind of like cancer free cigarettes. The coal industry would like to market "clean coal" . Kind of like light cigarettes,
But you can't just call something "Clean" without a definition of what clean is... The coal industry just wants people to accept their standards. Rather than standards that actually represent a reasonably clean fuel.
Coal burning was responsible for Acid rain, smog and dirty air for years.... That they can't produce a truly clean fuel from coal is coals problem, in the same way that being able to produce commercially viable wind or solar has to become that industries problem as the start up subsidies are wound down...
By the way, the coal industry has had all kinds of public grant money helping them try to develop an actually clean product....

No kidding about clean coal, the problem is Obama claims he embraces "clean coal" but then sets goals that are not achievable. ...That is no friend of coal!

as far as hurricanes, the alarmists say global warming "Might" have had a part in Sandy yet the real science shows little to no change in hurricane patterns. The biggest problem with the hurricanes that do hit is more and more people have built in areas that should not have buildings allowed, that and more and more expensive homes are being built in these dangerous areas ...ever driven along say the Jersey shore 40 years ago? 30 years ago? 10 years ago? recently? 40 years ago you would see shacks but the trend is to buy up those shacks, tear them down and build megamillion dollar estates, you see it all over the coast. Damage will be more-so, no doubt.

tom

No kidding about clean coal, the problem is Obama claims he embraces "clean coal" but then sets goals that are not achievable. ...That is no friend of coal.

Who knew, when the goals were set, that they couldn't be reached?
And why would you lower the standard? Whats the objective of the standard? Air we can breathe....
Would you be happy with air that only makes you sorta sick?

tom

as far as hurricanes, the alarmists say global warming "Might" have had a part in Sandy yet the real science shows little to no change in hurricane patterns. The biggest problem with the hurricanes that do hit is more and more people have built in areas that should not have buildings allowed, that and more and more expensive homes are being built in these dangerous areas ...ever driven along say the Jersey shore 40 years ago? 30 years ago? 10 years ago? recently? 40 years ago you would see shacks but the trend is to buy up those shacks, tear them down and build megamillion dollar estates, you see it all over the coast. Damage will be more-so, no doubt.

Its not the patterns, its the intensity of the hurricanes when they occur. And that comes down to the simple notion that the more energy there is in the oceans, the more energy will be released in the weather event... There's not much disagreement anymore that the oceans, particularly the Gulf of Mexico, are warmer than they have been in the past. (Mankinds period, that is)
There is a range of opinion on how much the increased warmth is contributing to the occurrence of more violent storms already. But little discussion about the basic physics principle applying at some point.
As for building in dangerous areas.... there is some truth to this. Especially when it comes to draining swamps and wet lands that have stood as natural buffers to storms, and replacing them with vulnerable communities..
But history tells us that almost anywhere on the Gulf is dangerous. In 1900 80,000 people died when a Hurricane levelled Gavelston texas. It was rebuilt, with very high sea walls.

I was thinking about Global Warming and to what extent any one of us could make substantive arguments about it. It seems to me that the different levels of expertise are as follows:

(1) You are a scientist in the field doing experiments in Global Warming. This would be the first level of expertise
(2) You are a scientist who has the expertise to understand the science behind Global Warming but do not actually do any experiments yourself;
(3) You are a non-scientist but have a Scientific background (maybe you majored in Chemistry or Physics in College) and can legitimately understand the scientific discussions behind global warming;
(4) You don't have a scientific background but you have read a lot about Global Warming and the scientific studies done;
(5) You are not a scientist, you don't have a scientific background, you don't read that much on Global Warming, but you have some views on the subject.

So probably Ricky is highest on this list at Level 4; I think I'm at Level 5 and probably everyone else is at Level 5. My reasoning goes like this--the majority of Scientists believe in Global Warming, I generally trust scientists (probably these are at Level 2 of expertise) will overall not let politics guide their beliefs, and therefore I believe in Global Warming. Not only that, the anti-Global Warming crowd tends to come from the same crowd that is anti-scientific. So that makes me believe in Global Warming even more.
However, in law there is the theory that hearsay testimony is unreliable. Similarly, I am so far removed from actual expertise on the subject that to argue on it is simply to repeat hearsay from scientists on the subject. So I am a bit dubious about Ricky's extremely high level of confidence on the issue, but even more dubious about the evidence from the anti-global warming crowd.

freeman2 wrote:I. Not only that, the anti-Global Warming crowd tends to come from the same crowd that is anti-scientific. So that makes me believe in Global Warming even more.

Overall a good post but I have problems with this line. The left is just as anti-science as the right but just in different topics.

Look to who makes up the majority of the anti-vaccination movement even though the science says it has nothing to do with Autism.

What side makes up the majority of the anti-GMO movement even though the science currently says it is safe.

Which side make up the majority of the anti-fracking movement even though the majority of the science seems to be saying it is safe.

The reality is more likely that the AGW critics are anti-science in the things you agree with while the AGW supporters are anti-science on the things you disagree with.

Ray Jay wrote:Rudewalrus:

The price of traditional energy is far more likely to increase, rather than decrease, making such things as wind a better bet.
...
If, as is likely, oil prices continue to rise,

I don't agree with your premise. As prices increase, supplies increase as well. The marketplace adjusts the price of oil (or other energy sources such as natural gas) over time. It has done so successfully for over 100 years. Here in New England new homes use natural gas instead of oil. New technologies allow for the drilling of oil in places where it was not possible 10 years ago. Ironically, the melting of the arctic has helped in this endeavor.

How do you convince yourself that it is different now so that oil prices rise rapidly above the rate of inflation? I think that your argument is predicated on oil prices increasing at greater than the rate of inflation whereas wind prices are increasing at less than the rate of inflation.

On one level you are correct. However your economic model assumes perfectly elastic supply, which is not the real-world situation. Oil is a finite resource, nobody seriously argues it is not. There is huge disagreement over when we will reach peak oil, but whether we get there in five years, twenty years, fifty years, or a hundred years, we will get there. Even today supply is not perfectly elastic. Yes, as prices rise, supplies increase, partly because reserves that had not been economically recoverable become so. At lower prices they would not be in production. Much of the world's producers are currently producing flat out. To increase production requires major investments in infrastructure, pipelines, refineries, etc...

Some eighty percent of current world production is from reserves dicovered decades ago. For many years, production has out-paced discovery. We've already found the 'easy' oil. What hasn't been found/developed will have a higher unit cost to produce.

Add the fact that demand is not static. Even with perfectly elastic supply, basic economics tells us that increased demand leads to increased supply - at increased price. With inelastic, or imperfectly elastic supply, the price increases at a faster rate. Demand in places like China (which is rapidly becoming the world's largest auto market), and India is increasing rapidly.

This is why oil prices will increase more rapidly than inflation. (Of courese, rising oil prices will in turn drive inflation higher also!)

As for wind, the resource is static (barring climate change effects that cannot be predicted, +/-). Even if cost only increases at the rate of inflation, it will be slower than oil. Further, it is not unreasonable to expect that technological advances will improve the cost-efficiency of the resource.

I'm not saying that wind is the greatest thing since sliced bread, or that it is the solution to all the world's problems. What I am saying is that there are good reasons to be optimistic about its potential. Also, that the trends suggest the demand for it in the future will be greater, not less, and in that case, it is better to be on the producing/exporting side of the equation rather than the consuming/importing side.

archduke

Look to who makes up the majority of the anti-vaccination movement even though the science says it has nothing to do with Autism.
What side makes up the majority of the anti-GMO movement even though the science currently says it is safe.
Which side make up the majority of the anti-fracking movement even though the majority of the science seems to be saying it is safe.
The reality is more likely that the AGW critics are anti-science in the things you agree with while the AGW supporters are anti-science on the things you disagree with

I thought the anti-vaccination mob was largely fundamental Christians and Jenny McCarthy? Maybe you have a link on this?
But aside from that a comment about the phrase "current science". When a product or process is being commercialized it is often introduced with scientific papers. Often, in things like drug developments and the development of resources the first and sometimes only "science" is the result of work done by the corporations who want to commercialize.
I think we've seen how that sometimes works in the pharmaceutical industry. And has happened in other areas. (remember some of the science from Tobacco companies?) The science can be self serving.
There is too much reliance on self regulating in some industries, like oil production, which has resulted in a history of calamities.
Having said that, in the case of frakking for instance, there was demonstrable fear mongering by some on the left. Although, the movie about Frakking that really focussed on the image of a water tap burning (naturally occurring methane, that happened before frakking in the region as it turned out) was financed by a Dubai oil company. (It was called Gasland I think?)
Whats important is that research be completely transparent and open to peer scrutiny. That is difficult when products and processes get to the commercialization phase.
There was recently new research announced on Frakking that gets to the level... So perhaps we can get to a higher level of certainty on the safety of that process soon....
The level of confidence that the scientific community on global warming comes, in large part, because the 3 large data sources for temperature collection are open sources for qualified scientists, and most published work was very transparent. Despite the nonsense about "Climate Gate" a number of years ago, scientists have shared resourced data completely openly.... Its taken a concerted efffort of distortion and misinformation to discredit that amongst the general public, but the scientific community was never more than momentarily distracted.

freeman

So I am a bit dubious about Ricky's extremely high level of confidence on the issue, but even more dubious about the evidence from the anti-global warming crowd.

I'm not that confident about the details Freeman, I am entirely confident in the general direction. I think that comes from being exposed to more scientific information in my daily media (The CBC focuses on the science of warming a lot) . Partly its because the Far North Canada is already experiencing significant changes , and the CBC has a mandate to report on all of Canada. Partly its because we already see things locally, even around Toronto that are a result of changing climate. (Animals that live around here now that have never been seen here before, like Opossum). As an average person you get confirmation from small things.
I also have a son in law who is an environmental scientist who's been working in the High Arctic on environmental remediation. Not involved in climate work, but part of the urgency of their work in recent years is that parts of the High Arctic were "unfreezing" for periods that have never experienced those periods in modern time.

Rudewalrus:

On one level you are correct. However your economic model assumes perfectly elastic supply, which is not the real-world situation. Oil is a finite resource, nobody seriously argues it is not. There is huge disagreement over when we will reach peak oil, but whether we get there in five years, twenty years, fifty years, or a hundred years, we will get there. Even today supply is not perfectly elastic. Yes, as prices rise, supplies increase, partly because reserves that had not been economically recoverable become so. At lower prices they would not be in production. Much of the world's producers are currently producing flat out. To increase production requires major investments in infrastructure, pipelines, refineries, etc...

Some eighty percent of current world production is from reserves dicovered decades ago. For many years, production has out-paced discovery. We've already found the 'easy' oil. What hasn't been found/developed will have a higher unit cost to produce.

Add the fact that demand is not static. Even with perfectly elastic supply, basic economics tells us that increased demand leads to increased supply - at increased price. With inelastic, or imperfectly elastic supply, the price increases at a faster rate. Demand in places like China (which is rapidly becoming the world's largest auto market), and India is increasing rapidly.

This is why oil prices will increase more rapidly than inflation. (Of courese, rising oil prices will in turn drive inflation higher also!)

As for wind, the resource is static (barring climate change effects that cannot be predicted, +/-). Even if cost only increases at the rate of inflation, it will be slower than oil. Further, it is not unreasonable to expect that technological advances will improve the cost-efficiency of the resource.

I'm not saying that wind is the greatest thing since sliced bread, or that it is the solution to all the world's problems. What I am saying is that there are good reasons to be optimistic about its potential. Also, that the trends suggest the demand for it in the future will be greater, not less, and in that case, it is better to be on the producing/exporting side of the equation rather than the consuming/importing side.

Your thesis is based on wind energy technlogy improving rapidly whereas oil technology improves not very much. This doesn't make sense to me. The history over the last 100 years is that oil technology continues to improve. Same goes with wind and solar technology over the last 20.

I'm old enough to be following the news since the early 70's. There have been predictions of peak oil for that entire time. However inflation adjusted oil is about the same price, and production is higher. In addition, my car is at least 3X more efficient. There is a tremendous amount of oil and gas that is not being drilled or being drilled inefficiently in Iran and Iraq and Africa and Venezuela and throughout the arctic and both coasts of the U.S. There is untapped natural gas throughout the world. Other countries have seen what the U.S. have done and want to immitate. There is gas in the Med., and gas in the Pacific near Asia. Oil comes from carbon based life, and carbon based life has covered the entire planet for a long time. You are right that in the short and medium term supply is inefficient, but in the long term it is relatively efficient. I'll bet the over on peak oil in 100 years. Frankly, by then I think we will be largely solar (and maybe off shore wind), but that's a discusion for another day.

Here's an interesting interview on solar energy from the financial press. http://online.barrons.com/article/inter ... rticle%3D1

I'm a believer in solar but the way the US government funds it is terribly inefficient. We should fund research, but the money the US and China have been funneling to private companies is just pork. Read on:

That's a great question. LDK Solar [LDK] was recently on the brink of going out of business. The government and banks came in and bailed them out, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. The same thing happened with Suntech.

The oversupply in solar is coming primarily from the Chinese economy. Local and national Chinese governments, via their local and national banks, are keeping companies around that should be going out of business.
...

Which is why all of the publicly traded companies in the Chinese market are losing money right now. Some of them are even losing money on a gross-margin basis. And they are all burning cash hand over fist.

If the Chinese companies are the low-cost producers and even they are in a bad way, what should we think of an American company like SunPower?

SunPower is in a bad situation, as is First Solar and anyone producing panels in the U.S. But the U.S. government has given these companies taxpayer money to build power-generation projects.

We have given these companies cash grants, loan guarantees, investment tax credits. These companies could fund these projects from their own balance sheets. A 500-megawatt solar plant costs nearly $2 billion, but when construction is done, the number of permanent jobs created is like 20 to 25. It is a complete waste of taxpayer money. ...

Didn't Warren Buffett's MidAmerican Energy agree to buy two SunPower projects for over $2 billion?

Yes. Those projects enjoy power purchase agreements struck back in 2008 and benefit from government guarantees and grants that are no longer available. So he'll get returns that you can't get on new projects.
...
People believe that these earnings are sustainable, but once these projects run out, First Solar will start losing money. They will have a couple of good quarters in 2013, and then they will burn cash, because they'll have to develop these projects on their own. The two biggest projects announced in the U.S. recently were won by Yingli. Why? Crystalline silicon modules are more efficient at converting solar energy to electricity—18% efficiency, versus 12.7% for First Solar's "thin film" technology—and they cost basically the same. Silicon modules are about 66 cents a watt, whereas thin film is about 60 to 65 cents. It does not make sense to use First Solar modules.

Not only is the taxpayer getting drubbed on the incentives, but the U.S. government is throwing incentives at thin-film modules that underperform.

I also like what Freeman had to say and I agree with most of what he had to say. Here's one of the problems not addresses, he assumes global warming scientists are above reproach

I generally trust scientists (probably these are at Level 2 of expertise) will overall not let politics guide their beliefs...

But is this true science? You no doubt question the motives of scientists who work for oil companies (and you should question them) but why not question these global warming scientists who owe their livelihoods to supporting warming? They too should be questioned and when they fail to allow those who do not believe access to the data (Ricky says this is not true but we have all seen plenty examples where this is not true) then they too should be questioned...

Tom, would you agree that corruption is partially a function of opportunity? Presumably the payoff from an oil company is potentially higher than the pay off from a wind company or university grant. If that's the case, one would expect more questionable science from the oil industry than from elsewhere.

I'm not denying that there are all sorts of biasses, and that there are always financial interests, and we should be wary of them all. Certainly Al Gore has done very well for himself. But as a matter of scale, I think we should be more worried about corruption from extremely large established industries such as oil or tobacco or pharmaceuticals or gun manufacturers.

Wind power is unlikely to ever play a major part in the energy mix. It currently relies wholly on subsidies in order to be cost-effective so either the efficiency of the technology needs to improve dramatically (possible, but by no means a certainty) or the cost of conventional energy sources needs to increase significantly to make wind competitive. Personally I think it's a dead end. Governments like it because it's currently the only proven, mature technology in the alternative energy sector (well, there's solar as well, but this can't yet be done on a mass scale) and so investing in wind can help to hit the arbitrary Kyoto targets. Ultimately it's a waste of money though. If the amount of money spent on subsidies for wind turbines were to be diverted into R&D we could seriously accelerate the search for much better technologies.

tom

But is this true science? You no doubt question the motives of scientists who work for oil companies (and you should question them) but why not question these global warming scientists who owe their livelihoods to supporting warming? They too should be questioned and when they fail to allow those who do not believe access to the data (Ricky says this is not true but we have all seen plenty examples where this is not true) then they too should be questioned...

yes, Tom. Its true science.
Climatologists do not owe their living to "global warming". They owe their living largely to the universities and science foundations that employ them and fund their research regardless of the potential outcome.
The only reason that some scientists became employed by the UN IPCC was that a consensus had arisen within the climatology field that we were on the way to a dangerous situation that required communicating the problem to the the global political community . The communication hasn't been fool proof, but then its been targeted by corporate interests with a lot of both critical comment worth reacting to and a lot of strait forward hokum.
Access to NOAA data and the other data bases was available through the Internet - first to just about anyone, and later to any credentialed scientist . I believe it still is.. the only time I tried accessing it I couldn't really understand what I'd accessed. If you have genuine information about limiting scientists access please link. My guess is that your information was posted years ago on the Internet and was debunked then.,... Its amazing how many of the same tired tales keep getting refreshed.
I know this because I followed some of the scientific debate about the data pool. Some people, amateurs, challenged a few data points because of adjustments made for urban heat sinks or equipment .... There was a long and raucous debate that was first; way out of proportion even if it had been accurately challenged, second, inaccurately challenged.
But just so we stay current. Here's the news today about climate in the USA:


2012 was the hottest year on record in the USA. (Beating 1998...)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/ ... story.html

No? how many "climatologists" existed only a decade ago? and who do they work for? If they found no reason for alarm, would they still have a job?
and does it really matter that an oil company might pay an expert "x" amount, because the IPCC pays less (but a decent living mind you) to those who claim alarmism ...does that make it less factual? The lefties love to cry "Question authority" yet here they completely ignore their own mantra and accept whatever is hoisted upon them.