Sen. Inhofe Says 'Cap And Trade' Dead in Senate

Ron Paul is one of only two that I know of that have learned what's really going on in economics and I can't remember the other one's name. Unfortunately, even RP quotes a number of things that are factually wrong.

I only read peer-reviewed data and then I discuss with other engineers, scientists, climatologists and physicists. I don't care one little bit who's signed or not, nor do I care what they've voted for in the past. It's completely irrelevant.

I explained how it's not going to double or tripple anything. Think of it like the price of uranium doubling. That only makes up 5% of the cost of nuclear power so doubling it's cost would only increase the power's cost by 5%. In the same way, increasing electrical power's cost by 10-25% will only cost you the same increase you're headed for anyway. The difference is that this profit goes to clean, renewable companies (minus the trader's cuts) where in the old way, the power company gets the entire treasure.

Keep in mind that when enough renewables hit the market, they'll compete on price with the centralized utility companies and your cost WILL drop. It's awefully hard to organize a monopoly (or oligopoly) between the producer and the consumer.

If renewable energy supply keeps pace with the retirement of fossil fueled energy, you won't see any price increase. The reason is that the government can't mandate the closing of plants any more than they can decide where to put up a wind farm or solar plant. They give incentives and developers build the projects. Unless there's a shortage of power, the price of wind power sold to the power company will be competitive with that company's current price. Otherwise they won't sign a 20 year PPA (power purchase agreement). That PPA then locks them into that price.

So the power price stays the same as long as there's no shortage. Of course many people think there will be a resulting shortage but I can tell you that there are more projects being proposed in renewables in every state than I ever dreamed of. My company gets calls from half a dozen per month and some are enormous compared to what has been built so far. If just our company could complete every project we've been approached on so far this year, we would surpass the growth of the nation for the entire year.

So, back to the fossil fueled energy companies costs going up. It doesn't have to if they clean up their generation. If not, then they will need to pay a small fee for the status quo. Currently, this cost is around $14/megawatt-hour. This means on $80-150 worth of power, the price goes up $14. Since there are speculators invovled, we'll just say 10-25%. Keep in mind that you bill is only about 25-60% paying for the power. The rest is taxes and fees and connection charges and distribution line maintenance costs and 'sweetheart deal' builtin costs. After figuring in all that, you'll be lucky to see a 3% to 8% increase and that's LOWER than anyone expects prices to rise from business as usual.

that the end result of this bill is much cheaper for everyone. It gives you the financial assistance to make your own electricity. If you can't, there will be excess from someone else who wants to make a buck by selling it to you. This is what we all want in a free market. Sure there are problems with it and I completely agree that the other recent and near term legislation are scary, but this works toward energy independence, not only for the individual but on a national basis as well.

You want to make money, research out some new tech that allows you to heat, cool and power your home without paying $50 in fees and THEN $75-500 in power bills.

You're afraid that this will cost us $3,000 per year? Sorry, but there's no way. We've already surpassed that price increase by market manipulation through stacked regulations in favor of big oil, coal, corn and electric. How can we trust that more of the same won't cause another $3k next year? All my estimates, and I've done half a dozen of them, have placed our cost increase per family and small business at $30/month or maybe double that. Keep in mind that that price is only if you're buying your power from fossil fuel based sources. If you purchase a solar PV system even today, you'd have it paid off in 4-15 years (depending on size and location and a few others) and that's while paying today's electric bill. What do you think you'd pay for that same power over the next 20 years?

not anyone else's. I've researched energy in all forms for decades now. I've learned just how much our lives are controlled by the energy monopolies. There is only one answer and that is to get off the grid and become energy self sustainable. I even started a couple businesses to do just that, both for myself and for others. I'm seeing now exactly how the energy corporations have controlled this game and what they want. That being more control. They don't want any renewables that compete with them. For this reason, they're ok with "traditional" wind and solar because they don't have any storage and external storage (aka batteries) is too expensive. Any new technologies with storage built in (and yes, there are a number of them) are getting regulated out of the game before they get started. You don't think renewables can compete, well put up a few million toward investment and see what secret information you get to sign a non-disclosure agreement for. You can believe that we don't need our centralized energy system spoon feeding us just enough energy to do what we need to, at the highest prices we can afford.

The only way these new companies can finance their products is to a) be self funding - they spent their money researching and developing or b) get guaranteed contracts for enough money for the sale of their electricity for 20 years - utilities won't pay any extra for clean or green, c) get government subsidies - they're getting a pittance compared to when oil, coal, NG or nuclear began or d) find a way for the polluting companies to assist the cleaner ones. That's what cap&trade is all about. I've been in high level energy discussions 8 years ago where it was determined that c&t was the only solution where the government didn't have control of where the money ended up. I realize that this gives the bankers 'some' control of it now, but we've got to start somewhere.