Tankless Task

Can we really live in a world with substantially fewer greenhouse gasses? Really cut our consumption and usage of fossil fuels without destroying our economy and growth potential? Or are we just kidding ourselves? We create economic structures that let us feel good about “doing something,” like the “cap and trade” mythology described below, but without the participation of “everybody,” can we accomplish our overall environmental goals? I’ve blogged about the need for the biggest polluter, China (which seems to be choking many of its citizens to death), to get with the program, but are we so far past the tipping point that we should just gird for the worst? Should we look at China, shrug our shoulders, and prepare for disaster?

“Cap and trade” sounds good and pragmatic. It sets an overall limit on greenhouse emissions but allows those who still exceed limits to “buy” the under-regulatory-limits compliance units from companies who are significantly below their set caps… and continue to pollute. This seems to create an economic disincentive to exceed limits and an economic incentive to comply. The problem with the theory is that the ease of buying these compliance units may or may not be significant hits to the bottom line of the polluting company. It is often much cheaper for many companies to continue to pollute than to consider fixing the problem. Just allowing companies to buy their way out of compliance often prevents a solution rather than mandating it.

But there are many other solutions involving improved technologies, greater consciousness in environment waste, continuing to mandate stricter mileage requirements for all kinds of vehicles, encouragement and incentives for alternative energy and general regulation of stationary polluters across the board. Does this form of regulation curtail growth or create new jobs to meet the challenges? Of course, there are no simple answers to any of this, and of course, there will be economic opportunity and economic displacement. The penalty for non-compliance may well be economic, human and social disaster with costs that dwarf the hard economic costs of compliance.

But can we really accomplish the goal? At least in the United States? “A National Research Council report released [in mid-March] concluded that the United States could halve by 2030 the oil used in cars and trucks compared with 2005 levels by improving the efficiency of gasoline-powered vehicles and by relying more on cars that use alternative power sources, like electric batteries and biofuels… Just days earlier a team of Stanford engineers published a proposal showing how New York State — not windy like the Great Plains, nor sunny like Arizona — could easily produce the power it needs from wind, solar and water power by 2030. In fact there was so much potential power, the researchers found, that renewable power could also fuel our cars.

“‘It’s absolutely not true that we need natural gas, coal or oil — we think it’s a myth,’ said Mark Z. Jacobson, a professor of civil and environmental engineering and the main author of the study, published in the journal Energy Policy. ‘You could power America with renewables from a technical and economic standpoint. The biggest obstacles are social and political — what you need is the will to do it.’ … Other countries have made far more concerted efforts to reduce fossil fuel use than the United States and have some impressive numbers to show for it. Of the countries that rely most heavily on renewable electricity, some, like Norway, rely on that old renewable, hydroelectric power. But others, like Denmark, Portugal and Germany, have created financial incentives to promote newer technologies like wind and solar energy.

“People convinced that America ‘needs’ the oil that would flow south from Canada through the Keystone XL pipeline might be surprised to learn that Canada produced 63.4 percent of its electricity from renewable sources in 2011, largely from hydropower and a bit of wind. (Maybe that is why Canada has all that oil to sell.) The United States got only 12.3 percent of its electricity from renewables in 2011. Still, many experts say that aggressively rebalancing the United States’ mix of fossil fuel and renewable energy to reduce its carbon footprint may well be impractical and unwise for now.” New York Times, March 23^rd.  

Forcing companies and governments to install scrubbers and more efficient technologies that do not increase profitability or stimulate immediately measurable growth is a tough ask. Many point to the fact that we compete with foreign manufacturers who don’t have such compliance costs under their local laws. Maybe we succeed, maybe we fail, maybe we wind up in the middle… but exactly what do we owe to future generations in terms of safe air and clean water?

I’m Peter Dekom, and the sin has to be in not even trying!