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Originally Posted by eccieuser9500
The Surprising Case For Air Conditioning As Essential Infrastructure
Why the meh about carbon-belching boxes? The IEA says increased energy efficiency and total replacement of fossil fuels by clean, renewable energy in producing electricity will allow the world to bask in AC without blistering the climate. That is, if nations coordinate massive investments in clean energy and infrastructure.
If Republicans couldn’t stomach Biden’s proposals, they’ll gag on the IEA’s plan, which includes carbon taxes; Green New Deal-style, eco-friendly technology in public works; and phasing out federal fossil fuel subsidies. (Capitalists object to corporate welfare in theory, but this particular corporate sector bathes Republican pseudo-capitalists in campaign welfare.)
https://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/202...ge-rich-barlow
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It's not as simple as it seems eccieuser. There are people in Mumbai slum apartment blocks suffering 100 degree Fahrenheit temperatures, in their homes, with no A/C. Who are we to tell people in 3rd world countries they can't have A/C, or cars, or indoor lighting? While yes places like India and China are using more renewables, they're also building coal fired power plants at a furious pace. I believe China has 200 to 250 GW of coal fired power plants under development and India has around 60 GW under construction. That's out of a total world wide capacity of 2000 GW, so we're looking at significant increases.
The U.S. currently accounts for around 15% of worldwide CO2 emissions, and that number will continue to go down with time. We're at risk of destroying our domestic oil and gas industry and reducing our level of energy security, without doing anything that will substantively improve the outlook for global warming. All that we'll accomplish is having a self righteous, sanctimonious feeling about saving the world when we're really doing nothing.
As to your red text, the tax subsidies, oil and gas pay more than their fair share of taxes. The upstream pays severance taxes to the states, the downstream pays the gasoline tax (which admittedly is passed on to consumers), and the industry has lots of fixed assets that bear property taxes. The only real subsidy is percentage depletion, which only smaller companies get. The industry also gets to write off capital investments faster than perhaps it should, but that only affects the timing of when taxes are paid, not the actual amount paid.
