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The Cap and Trade Bill - Page 2

post #51 of 61
7/1/09 at 10:21pm
No, he's worried Shakira will get fat.
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post #52 of 61
7/1/09 at 10:26pm

Oddly enough, Wall Street is eager for CapTrade to pass

Matthew Goldstein is a Reuters columnist. The views expressed are his own --

NEW YORK - The opposition by the Republicans to the idea of carbon trading is a bit baffling, given that it is a classic Wall Street-driven solution for dealing with a serious problem.

Sure, carbon trading, which is the centerpiece of the Obama administration-backed American Clean Energy and Security Act, would carry a cost for consumers and companies that emit too much in greenhouse gases. But the economic impact of the bill's so-called cap-and-trade scheme would be modest -- costing the average household $175 a year in added expenses, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

What's actually more baffling is President Obama's infatuation with this trading scheme, which will benefit the global environment, but will also fatten the wallets of Wall Street traders. A simple tax on polluters and carbon producers would get the job done without the kind of wealth transfer to the gilded class that Republicans generally support.

It's easy to see why Wall Street, which has been waiting for carbon trading to ignite in the United States, favors the measure.

The bill would impose a hard cap on carbon emissions for all U.S. companies. But it would permit businesses that produce less carbon emissions to sell "credits" to companies that exceed the cap -- hence the name cap-and-trade. The legislation calls for the carbon credits to be traded on regulated exchanges and that, of course, is where Wall Street comes in.

Wall Street trading desks will make money from handling both ends of the cap-and-trade transactions. Yet it's not too hard to imagine that there are some Wall Street bankers already dreaming up some newfangled "green-friendly" investment product that will capitalize on this trade, which can then be peddled to retail investors.

Cap-and-trade just might be the shot in the arm that the ailing structured finance market needs. Is that the kind of "green jobs" we really want?

Another obvious winner from the passage of a cap-and-trade bill will be the Chicago Climate Exchange, which has struggled to find a market since it opened for business in 2003. The Green Exchange, a soon-to-launch trading platform being built by CME Group's CME.O Nymex division also should get a needed jolt.

The hedge fund industry is looking to catch the green wave, as well. Da Vinci Invest Ltd. of Switzerland, for instance, recently began raising money for its carbon-trading Green Falcon Fund.

But a so-called carbon tax on companies based on the level of greenhouse gases their products produce would cut out the Wall Street middleman altogether. A carbon tax also would make greenhouse gas pariahs, like gas-guzzling cars, cost a lot more. And that's something that would immediately impact consumer behavior.

Selling a carbon tax, however, would take political courage because of that dreaded three-letter word. And sadly that kind of courage is in short supply in Washington. (Editing by Martin Langfield)

By: Matthew Goldstein
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post #53 of 61
7/2/09 at 1:21pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by capinkevey View Post
Is hipper inflation a more trendy and hip version of Hyperinflation?
If you cheapskates thought Abercrombie jeans were expensive already you're not going to like what's coming.
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post #54 of 61
7/6/09 at 7:14pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cylon Baby View Post
Cap-and-trade just might be the shot in the arm that the ailing structured finance market needs. Is that the kind of "green jobs" we really want?
Not to mention... Green Stimulus Money Costs More Jobs Than It Creates, Study Shows

"Spain’s experience (cited by President Obama as a model) reveals with high confidence, by two different methods, that the U.S. should expect a loss of at least 2.2 jobs on average, or about 9 jobs lost for every 4 created, to which we have to add those jobs that non-subsidized investments with the same resources would have created,” wrote Calzada in his report: Study of the Effects on Employment of Public Aid to Renewable Energy Sources.


I'd like to know how Obama rationalizes that Cap&Trade ISN'T more taxes for the 95% or a detriment to employment.
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post #55 of 61
7/6/09 at 7:37pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by DARKMITE8 View Post


I'd like to know how Obama rationalizes that Cap&Trade ISN'T more taxes for the 95% or a detriment to employment.
Hes unable to, which is par for the course so far unfortunately.

Also, here is the article yt referenced on the previous page regarding Goldman Sachs: http://zerohedge.blogspot.com/2009/0...ery-major.html
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post #56 of 61
7/14/09 at 2:52pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by yt View Post
Matt Taibbi has a truly gut-wrenching story in this month's Rolling Stone about Goldman Sachs. I'm reading it now and it's literally making my stomach roil. He makes the case that Goldman Sachs has been a key player in 5 financial bubbles from the Depression in the 20s to the future bubble in the carbon-credit market. Unfortunately it's not online yet but it should be mandatory reading for every voting-age American. I'll link to it as soon as I see it online.
This article is now online at Rolling Stone: The Great American Bubble Machine. It's an informative and highly entertaining read, that starts out like this:
Quote:
The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it's everywhere. The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money. In fact, the history of the recent financial crisis, which doubles as a history of the rapid decline and fall of the suddenly swindled dry American empire, reads like a Who's Who of Goldman Sachs graduates.
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post #57 of 61
7/14/09 at 3:05pm
Don't worry, Sarah Palin is here to explain the whole thing!
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post #58 of 61
7/14/09 at 3:48pm
http://www.environmentalleader.com/2...per-household/
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post #59 of 61
7/14/09 at 4:04pm
I've got news for ya, Sarah.

This...
Quote:
American prosperity has always been driven by the steady supply of abundant, affordable energy.
...is already over. You just don't know it yet. An increasingly unpredictable climate, resource wars, and the delicate politics of geo-engineering are all looking more and more likely. The cognitive dissonance coming down the pike at people like Sarah Palin over the next 20 years is going to be massive.

http://blog.longnow.org/2009/01/19/s...-recalculated/

Quote:
The Terawatt World

Engineer Griffith said he was going to make the connection between personal actions and global climate change. To do that he’s been analyzing his own life in extreme detail to figure out exactly how much energy he uses and what changes might reduce the load. In 2007, when he started, he was consuming about 18,000 watts, like most Americans.

The energy budget of the average person in the world is about 2,200 watts. Some 90 percent of the carbon dioxide overload in the atmosphere was put there by the US, USSR (of old), China, Germany, Japan, and Britain. The rich countries have the most work to do.

What would it take to level off the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere at 450 parts per million (ppm)? That level supposedly would keep global warming just barely manageable at an increase of 2 degrees Celsius. There still would be massive loss of species, 100 million climate refugees, and other major stresses. The carbon dioxide level right now is 385 ppm, rising fast. Before industrialization it was 296 ppm. America’s leading climatologist, James Hanson, says we must lower the carbon dioxide level to 350 ppm if we want to keep the world we evolved in.

The world currently runs on about 16 terawatts (trillion watts) of energy, most of it burning fossil fuels. To level off at 450 ppm of carbon dioxide, we will have to reduce the fossil fuel burning to 3 terawatts and produce all the rest with renewable energy, and we have to do it in 25 years or it’s too late. Currently about half a terrawatt comes from clean hydropower and one terrawatt from clean nuclear. That leaves 11.5 terawatts to generate from new clean sources.

That would mean the following. (Here I’m drawing on notes and extrapolations I’ve written up previously from discussion with Griffith):

“Two terawatts of photovoltaic would require installing 100 square meters of 15-percent-efficient solar cells every second, second after second, for the next 25 years. (That’s about 1,200 square miles of solar cells a year, times 25 equals 30,000 square miles of photovoltaic cells.) Two terawatts of solar thermal? If it’s 30 percent efficient all told, we’ll need 50 square meters of highly reflective mirrors every second. (Some 600 square miles a year, times 25.) Half a terawatt of biofuels? Something like one Olympic swimming pools of genetically engineered algae, installed every second. (About 15,250 square miles a year, times 25.) Two terawatts of wind? That’s a 300-foot-diameter wind turbine every 5 minutes. (Install 105,000 turbines a year in good wind locations, times 25.) Two terawatts of geothermal? Build 3 100-megawatt steam turbines every day-1,095 a year, times 25. Three terawatts of new nuclear? That’s a 3-reactor, 3-gigawatt plant every week-52 a year, times 25.”

In other words, the land area dedicated to renewable energy (”Renewistan”) would occupy a space about the size of Australia to keep the carbon dioxide level at 450 ppm. To get to Hanson’s goal of 350 ppm of carbon dioxide, fossil fuel burning would have to be cut to ZERO, which means another 3 terawatts would have to come from renewables, expanding the size of Renewistan further by 26 percent.

Meanwhile for individuals, to stay at the world’s energy budget at 16 terawatts, while many of the poorest in the world might raise their standard of living to 2,200 watts, everyone now above that level would have to drop down to it. Griffith determined that most of his energy use was coming from air travel, car travel, and the embodied energy of his stuff, along with his diet. Now he drives the speed limit (and he has passed no one in six months), seldom flies, eats meat only once a week, bikes a lot, and buys almost nothing. He’s healthier, eats better, has more time with his family, and the stuff he has he cherishes.

Can the world actually build Renewistan? Griffeth said it’s not like the Manhattan Project, it’s like the whole of World War II, only with all the antagonists on the same side this time. It’s damn near impossible, but it is necessary. And the world has to decide to do it.

Griffith’s audience was strangely exhilerated by the prospect.
Cap and Trade looks kind of silly when you look at the true magnitude of the problem.
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post #60 of 61
7/14/09 at 5:38pm
Bingo. It's proponents acknowledge that but say it's better than nothing. I don't know if a weak bill that is a giveaway to the coal industry and Goldman Sachs is better than nothing. I don't really know the answer...
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post #61 of 61
7/14/09 at 9:57pm
Realistically, IF this whole climate change thing is actually working the way a now majority of talking heads claims it works (ie a lot of human influence), we have passed the point of no return before we even knew about it.

Which doesnt mean we should just ignore it, but the idea of being able to completely stop or even revert in some ways is not feasible. I realize people love hearing that everything will be ok if they just do the right thing, but its not going to happen, period.

What can happen is slowing down the process, and then looking whether things actually do get better. I am not entirely sold on the actual size of the impact mankind has on earths climate, mind you, but in any case, the longer proponents of doing something about it try and argue for measures that would completely change things, the longer this goes on, because frankly, people will not, and never again, make these sacrifices.
If you can sell a more reasonable plan that actually sounds as if its working and doesnt expect us to deconstruct our society and rebuild it from the ground up, you ll likely get more support.

Mind you, people will probably not care as long as bigger problems, for their immediate concern, loom on the horizon.
I personally think this is just a development we will have to live with. This juggernaut will stop when we run out of fuel for it, not earlier.
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