Posted on 08/20/2007 2:13:08 PM PDT by EPW Comm Team
Stunning proof that, at least in the short term, all those kyoto-like bills in Congress will do is hobble our economy more while the Red Chinese laugh at us.
I apologize for the fact that this is from the Washington Post, because you need to have a login ID to read the following. But you should. So should a lot of other people who probably won't.
Hope on Climate Change? Here's Why
A quote or two:
"Los Angeles has had 30 years of consistent improvement in reducing smog. ... As conservatives would expect, these gains were largely the result of technology -- the catalytic converter in automobiles and reformulated gasoline -- and not by pedaling to work or undoing the Industrial Revolution. ... This technological progress would not have taken place as a result of the free market alone. Easterbrook argues that as long as producing pollution is a free good -- without cost to the polluter -- there is little economic incentive to produce new methods to restrict it. Federal and state regulations on auto emissions and air quality created an environment in which the invention of new technologies was economically necessary."
and
"There is another, more compelling reason to consider a cap on the production of carbon dioxide. As in the case of fighting Los Angeles smog, this type of government regulation would create economic incentives for the development of new technologies -- incentives that do not exist in the free market. Capturing and storing carbon dioxide from power plants, by all accounts, is a difficult technical challenge. But the problem is much more likely to be solved if someone has a direct economic interest in solving it."
Read the rest. For added incentive, I don't like Easterbrook's common rosy picture of things.
bttt
three older topics, this and these two:
“What If All the Ice Melts?” Myths and Realities
Johnston Archive | 12/29/2005 | Wm. Robert Johnston
Posted on 01/27/2007 6:32:27 PM PST by Dallas59
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1774884/posts
Prius Outdoes Hummer in Environmental Damage
The Recorder-Central Connecticut State University
March 7, 2007 | Chris Demorro
Posted on 03/14/2007 2:00:06 PM PDT by tcrlaf
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1800912/posts
from:
http://www.freerepublic.com/~patton/links
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