…And trading carbon credits makes economy-crashing Fannie Mae rich from cash made on the trade itself; and rich on the carbon credits they suck up from federal mortgage holders. And your energy costs rise to pay for those carbon credit swaps. This is a mega-scam and no semantics can put enough lipstick on this swine to make it attractive. We won’t be fooled again, please God.
I think the idea that carbon taxes are the only way to mitigate climate change is bogus – esp when all they are expected do is make people’s energy expenditures go up bec no one is actually willing to drive less or more efficiently, and no one is further insulating their homes or doing other wise and prudent things to reduce their energy consumption.
That would do NOTHING to reduce GW and would only make profligate, gluttonous people very angry – and you don’t want to anger those types.
OTOH, the huge bulk of actions have to be voluntary actions on the parts of families, churches, businesses, and the government to reduce their GHG emissions in whatever ways they can – first by plucking the low hanging fruit of cost-effective measures that save money without lowering productivity or living standards. That would get us down by 60 to 75% below our 1990 emissions in the U.S.
The government can help by (1) reducing its own emissions, and (2) encouraging and helping people reduce, by providing information, appropriate carrots (subsidies), sticks (feeds), and low interest loans for becoming efficient…like their Green Lights Program some 15 years ago, which gave low interest loans to businesses to install more efficient lighting, which would be paid back out of their monthly energy savings from that.
For instance, the Jewel Supermarket chain in the Chicagoland area got onto it and replaced all their regular 2-tube light fixtures with a one-light fixture with electronic ballasts and a reflective casing – cutting their lighting energy use by more than half without reducing the lighting, and letting them pay the $1 million loan in about a year, thereafter going on to save them about $1 million per year.
Then there is the issue of indirect GHG emissions we can reduce. There are GHG emissions involved in resource extraction, shipping, processing, manufacturing, product usage and disposal. Reducing, reusing, recycling and buying recycled can go a long way in reducing GHGs.
Finally with all that money households save over a couple of decades they may then be able to afford a Chevy Volt, run it on 100% wind energy, and save even more money (we figure the savings from our Volt will pay for the difference between it and the Ford Taurus my husband wanted in about 6.5 years and go on to save us more over the succeeding years).
So GW mitigation does not COST us money, it SAVES us a bundle, while mitigating other problems to boot. Or as Confucius say, “Turning off lights not in use save money, not cost money.”
