redpanda’s Recent Comments

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  Why the surprise?

  This is exactly what he said he'd do throughout the campaign:  15 billion dollars a year for 10 years for developing clean alternative energy.

  I know that since then we've seen the passage of a 700 billion dollar stimulus law, but 150 billion dollars is still a lot of money.On What percentage of auction revenue is rebated? posted 8 months, 2 weeks ago 10 Responses

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  That's what I'm talking about

  Every time I hear green energy or green infrastructure is priority one, I get goosebumps.On Rahm Emanuel: First Obama priority is stimulus via green infrastructure posted 11 months, 3 weeks ago 6 Responses

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  From a strictly economic standpoint...

  There are two ways to bring down cost in a free market.  Increase supply or decrease demand.  If we control 3 percent of the world's oil reserves but consume 25 percent of the world's oil, we don't have a lot of leverage to bring down the price of oil by increasing production.  We DO have a lot of leverage to bring down the price of oil by consuming less.

  I think Palin is trying to imply that if we crack open ANWR, all that oil will flow straight into American gas tanks, which is wrong.  It's going to be sold to the highest bidder based on global oil prices, and there's not enough oil there to bring those prices down.On Palin gives first big speech on 'strategic energy independence' posted 1 year ago 4 Responses

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  the "all-of-the-above approach"

  Obama has put a dollar figure on how much he wants to spend on R&D for getting off fossil fuels.  It's a very concrete kind of support.

  When McCain talks about supporting carbon-free energy, I don't know what kind of support he's talking about.  Obviously McCain is for deregulating everything, but beyond that, what resources is he willing to commit to energy when he's reducing federal revenue with his tax cuts to the wealthy?

  Is he only offering moral support?  I think we can do better than that from the federal government for one of the top two or three challenges the country faces for the next two or three decades.On McCain/Palin nuclear plan would make U.S. more dependent on Russia for energy posted 1 year, 1 month ago 5 Responses

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  Being Serious about Global Warming

  Considering the massive amount of infrastructure already in place for coal extraction, transportation, and burning, it's unrealistic to suggest that the next president will flip a switch and end coal as a component of our energy mix.

  There are a lot of reasons for environmentalists to hate coal.  Ecosystems and natural hydrological systems are ruined by mountaintop removal, coal-burning power plants emit dangerous levels of mercury and other pollutants, and of course, coal is one of the top contributors to global warming.

  But if environmentalists are going to have any credibility on the seriousness of global warming, we can't use carbon emissions as a backdoor to attacking coal because we don't like it for other reasons.

  From everything I've read on Grist and elsewhere, I doubt that carbon sequestration is technically and economically feasible.  But we don't know, because nobody has actually built a CCS coal plant.  For all the lip-service that carbon sequestration has received and all the hope that some politicians have pinned on it, I don't think it's a bad idea to try it out and see how it works.  But the fights against mountaintop removal and mercury emissions should be fought on their own merits.On McCain and Obama campaigns trade jabs over who's a bigger coal supporter posted 1 year, 1 month ago 7 Responses