Posted on 09/13/2006 10:08:44 AM PDT by presidio9
The increasingly urgent need to combat climate change will probably spawn U.S. policies to impose fossil fuel charges and so dramatically favor nuclear power, Citigroup said in a research note on Wednesday.
Burning fossil fuels such as coal and oil is one of the biggest sources of the greenhouse gas emissions that scientists fear are leading to dangerous climate change.
In response, a carbon market in Europe already charges heavy industry to emit carbon dioxide (CO2) above a certain limit -- requiring companies to buy tradeable carbon credits -- and some U.S. states are set to adopt similar schemes.
This will sort winners from losers in power markets, with nuclear especially seen benefiting from increases in power prices driven by carbon charging, as zero-carbon emitters facing none of the costs of having to buy carbon credits.
"Under such (U.S.) legislation nuclear generators would win," Citigroup said.
"Nuclear Winners... should see material gross margin expansion, as revenues will likely rise dramatically without costs escalating."
Carbon markets work by giving for free or auctioning a certain quota of carbon credits, and businesses have to buy extra credits if their emissions exceed that quota.
Coal generators could lose out -- depending on how tough the new regimes are.
A tough regime would see governments auction rather give away for free the baseline quota, and would set these quotas less generously.
As the European Union's scheme showed last year -- when a there was a surplus of credits -- countries are finding it difficult to set tough targets given complaints from some industry about the possible impact on competitiveness.
"Coal generators in gas markets would likely suffer in strict regimes, which are unlikely given their economic impact."
Coal generators which the bank said faced a "material downside exposure" from a strict regime included Allegheny, Dynegy, Edison, NRG, and TXU.
Nuclear generators Entergy, Exelon, and Constellation stood to be significant beneficiaries, it said.
Fear ? Then they aren't scientists, and they have proven absolutely nothing regarding the human contribution to global climate change...
And all the while, a forlorn Yucca Mountain sits empty. It's sad really...
But if we huddle together for warmth, eat vegetarian, and ride bicycles, then we won't need to burn anything! Won't the world be wonderful?
Yay!
No, won't happen. The moonbats and enviro-nazis will do what they have been doing for thirty years -- sue, sue, sue. In the meantime the landscape will be visually polluted with ugly wind turbines that specialize in chopping up birds, and with solar arrays that occupy large swarths of land, are terribly inefficient, only operate during daylight and provide a fraction of the power demand. But to the nut whackos, that's the way society must go.
Lousy premise alert.
Whatever. If the solution is to go nuclear, I prepared not to argue with the left on this nonsense.
So can we say the the anti-nuke folk of the 60's and 70's were key contributors to global warming?
The "solution", according to the story, is an energy tax. I agree nuclear is a very good idea, but I don't think taxing everything else is the way to get there.
Isn't that a photo of where they used to keep the StarGate? :)
Those same states had better be bracing for a precipitous decline in business presence and jobs as businesses leave the state in droves. Already happening in CA.
SciFi cancelled the show, right about the time they ran the 200th episode.
We CAN say that, not because it's true, but if it gets the enviro-wackos to start fighting with each other, it's a good thing.
What?!!!!
My reaction as well. I found out last week when I read a comment in, of all things, a comic strip. Turns out, there are threads about it here on FR; just search SG-1.
IMO, the show had just founds its legs again with the revised cast. But... the SciFi Channel has other priorities - such as Who Wants To Be a Superhero. *sigh*
That's sad. I even enjoyed the reruns. I liked Jack Carter; his off beat sense of humor made the show watchable.
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