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Yes, I've been saying it over and over: raise the price of oil until gasoline et al are $20+/gallon. Then nuclear will be cheap. Why are we letting a silly thi

Yes, I've been saying it over and over: raise the price of oil until gasoline et al are $20+/gallon. Then nuclear will be cheap. Why are we letting a silly thing like scarcity, supply, and demand dictate whether we self-destruct?

jdeibele 6y ago
I've been saying for a long time that the US should increase the tax on gas steadily every year. Even a nickel a year would be OK but more would be better. People would be able to plan on the price increasing every year and make sound economic decisions on whether they wanted to move closer to work, etc. Unfortunately, it became apparent about the same time that the US is almost incapable of doing something in an organized fashion. People would scream about the price of gas going up and it would be rolled back. Or there'd be subsidies that would negate the tax increases.
- Mediterraneo10 6y ago
  Fuel in the US is already much more expensive than two decades ago. I remember buying a gallon for around 90 cents in 1999, and at the same time I read a newspaper article about some immigrant-run stations on the Jersey shore that had slashed their prices to several cents below that, as they were content to make a tiny profit margin and play a long game. Now a gallon costs more than twice as much as then, but as far as I can tell the average American has not made significant lifestyle changes with regard to vehicle usage: they just suck it up.
  - Xorlev 6y ago
    $0.90 in 1999 is $1.41 today. Near me, gas is ~$2 (give or take). So, more expensive (~40-50%), but not double.
    - Mediterraneo10 6y ago
      Granted, it may not be quite double, but average American salaries have not entirely kept pace with inflation in the last twenty years, so fuel expenses are appreciably higher than simply counting the inflation in.
    - jacquesm 6y ago
      Here it's closer to $2 / liter. (1/4 of a Gallon).
      - tremon 6y ago
        Sure, but your "here" isn't in the US.
        jacquesm 6y ago
        Indeed, which is why I provided that datapoint.
    - jsight 6y ago
      0.90 is also an outlier for 1999. The average price was closer to $1.20 back then.
  - smichel17 6y ago
    ...and I remember paying almost $4/gallon, around 10 years ago (I think), with no expectation that the price would drop. Gas is crazy cheap rift now.
nine_k 6y ago
Most fossil-based electric generation is not oil; it's either natural gas (reasonably clean, though it does produce a lot of CO₂), or coal (terrible on many counts). I'd say that killing coal would have a large effect. It would also put entire town populations out of work — a really hard problem, read about how UK tackled it in 1970s and 1980s, it was painful and ugly.
- pjc50 6y ago
  The death of UK coal was all to do with economics of importing coal and labour prices and relations, rather than climate change. But also that's why most green parties talk of a "just transition", subsidy to the workers who will lose their jobs.
  - hardlianotion 6y ago
    It was also to do with cleaner energy generation and taking advantage of natural gas resources in North Sea. Dash to Gas was a major enabler of the switch away from coal in the 90s.
- DennisP 6y ago
  At the end of 2016 there were 50,000 coal miners in the US.[1] Their average annual pay is $29K.[2] We could give each of them one million dollars, invested and paying out 3% annually, and the $50B it costs would be a drop in the bucket compared to the economic benefit of eliminating those carbon emissions. In fact, it would even be cheaper than the healthcare costs of pollution from coal plants, which amounts to $187 billion in the U.S.[3] And in Appalachia, healthcare costs from coal production are $75B annually, so we'd come out ahead there too, which would be a double benefit for the miners since they'd be both richer and healthier. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_mining_in_the_United_States#Coal_mining_employment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_mining_in_the_United_Stat... [2] https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/coal-miner-salary-SRCH_KO0,10.htm https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/coal-miner-salary-SRCH_KO... [3] https://e360.yale.edu/digest/coal-costs-us-half-trillion-annually-in-hidden-costs-study-says https://e360.yale.edu/digest/coal-costs-us-half-trillion-ann...
tuatoru 6y ago
> Then nuclear will be cheap. But it still won't be built, because Solar PV and wind are roughly two-thirds the cost and falling. (Including the cost of backup power supplies for periods of low sun or low wind.) (Not to mention having much shorter construction times until first revenue, lower delay risk, lower investment risk, and lower operation and maintenance costs.) Nuclear had its chance in the 1990s. Today, we have cheaper and better options.

jdeibele 6y ago

I've been saying for a long time that the US should increase the tax on gas steadily every year. Even a nickel a year would be OK but more would be better. People would be able to plan on the price increasing every year and make sound economic decisions on whether they wanted to move closer to work, etc. Unfortunately, it became apparent about the same time that the US is almost incapable of doing something in an organized fashion. People would scream about the price of gas going up and it would be rolled back. Or there'd be subsidies that would negate the tax increases.

Mediterraneo10 6y ago
Fuel in the US is already much more expensive than two decades ago. I remember buying a gallon for around 90 cents in 1999, and at the same time I read a newspaper article about some immigrant-run stations on the Jersey shore that had slashed their prices to several cents below that, as they were content to make a tiny profit margin and play a long game. Now a gallon costs more than twice as much as then, but as far as I can tell the average American has not made significant lifestyle changes with regard to vehicle usage: they just suck it up.
- Xorlev 6y ago
  $0.90 in 1999 is $1.41 today. Near me, gas is ~$2 (give or take). So, more expensive (~40-50%), but not double.
  - Mediterraneo10 6y ago
    Granted, it may not be quite double, but average American salaries have not entirely kept pace with inflation in the last twenty years, so fuel expenses are appreciably higher than simply counting the inflation in.
  - jacquesm 6y ago
    Here it's closer to $2 / liter. (1/4 of a Gallon).
    - tremon 6y ago
      Sure, but your "here" isn't in the US.
      - jacquesm 6y ago
        Indeed, which is why I provided that datapoint.
  - jsight 6y ago
    0.90 is also an outlier for 1999. The average price was closer to $1.20 back then.
- smichel17 6y ago
  ...and I remember paying almost $4/gallon, around 10 years ago (I think), with no expectation that the price would drop. Gas is crazy cheap rift now.

nine_k 6y ago

Most fossil-based electric generation is not oil; it's either natural gas (reasonably clean, though it does produce a lot of CO₂), or coal (terrible on many counts). I'd say that killing coal would have a large effect. It would also put entire town populations out of work — a really hard problem, read about how UK tackled it in 1970s and 1980s, it was painful and ugly.

pjc50 6y ago
The death of UK coal was all to do with economics of importing coal and labour prices and relations, rather than climate change. But also that's why most green parties talk of a "just transition", subsidy to the workers who will lose their jobs.
- hardlianotion 6y ago
  It was also to do with cleaner energy generation and taking advantage of natural gas resources in North Sea. Dash to Gas was a major enabler of the switch away from coal in the 90s.
DennisP 6y ago
At the end of 2016 there were 50,000 coal miners in the US.[1] Their average annual pay is $29K.[2] We could give each of them one million dollars, invested and paying out 3% annually, and the $50B it costs would be a drop in the bucket compared to the economic benefit of eliminating those carbon emissions. In fact, it would even be cheaper than the healthcare costs of pollution from coal plants, which amounts to $187 billion in the U.S.[3] And in Appalachia, healthcare costs from coal production are $75B annually, so we'd come out ahead there too, which would be a double benefit for the miners since they'd be both richer and healthier. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_mining_in_the_United_States#Coal_mining_employment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_mining_in_the_United_Stat... [2] https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/coal-miner-salary-SRCH_KO0,10.htm https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/coal-miner-salary-SRCH_KO... [3] https://e360.yale.edu/digest/coal-costs-us-half-trillion-annually-in-hidden-costs-study-says https://e360.yale.edu/digest/coal-costs-us-half-trillion-ann...

tuatoru 6y ago

> Then nuclear will be cheap. But it still won't be built, because Solar PV and wind are roughly two-thirds the cost and falling. (Including the cost of backup power supplies for periods of low sun or low wind.) (Not to mention having much shorter construction times until first revenue, lower delay risk, lower investment risk, and lower operation and maintenance costs.) Nuclear had its chance in the 1990s. Today, we have cheaper and better options.