Where are the federal subsidies in the USA for green tech?

[GTaudiophile]

I was just listening to NPR about how within a decade or so, 1 in 4 Japanese homes will be powered by a Hydrogen fuel cell. They currently cost $30K but the Japanese subsidies 50% of the cost, giving families a $15K credit.

In Germany, the so-called "feed-in" laws not only subsidize solar and wind technology but also force power companies to purchase excess private energy at market rates. Meaning, if my house creates more solar and wind power than I need, my local provider must buy it from me.

Are such ideas in the new Cap & Trade legislation or not?

 

[sandorski]

This is what can be done when people take it seriously. Whether C&T will do it I dunno, in fact I kinda doubt it's the best way to do this particular type of thing. This takes a more direct approach.

 

[Fenixgoon]

currently you can sell power back to the grid with wind/solar IIRC. the whole problem is that they cost a shitload. current subsidies still don't make them competitive on a commercial scale - where things tend to be most efficient. the only way to make solar/wind more readily adoptable is to let the tech mature to the point where it is affordable and people are willing to buy it for their homes.

and how do you suppose we give 30k subsidies with the amount of debt we're in?

 

[Moonbeam]

currently you can sell power back to the grid with wind/solar IIRC. the whole problem is that they cost a shitload. current subsidies still don't make them competitive on a commercial scale - where things tend to be most efficient. the only way to make solar/wind more readily adoptable is to let the tech mature to the point where it is affordable and people are willing to buy it for their homes.

and how do you suppose we give 30k subsidies with the amount of debt we're in?

The way you get it developed to affordability is to subsidize it early on.

 

[Moonbeam]

The party of death is busy making a case that we are too far in debt to save ourselves and that we should die with our boots paid for.

Let the rest of the world save themselves. We can't afford to do so ourselves. It's just better that we die.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

if we were self sufficient on energy that would ruin there plans to make us all dependent on the government.

 

[Zebo]

We have them. I'm thinking about doing geothermal - not cuz I'm an environmentalist but to get off the grid at least partially. Anyway sniff around here http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=206871,00.html

 

[Robor]

if we were self sufficient on energy that would ruin there plans to make us all dependent on the government.

Someone has their tin foil hat on too tight lately. Is this you...

 

[0marTheZealot]

I was just listening to NPR about how within a decade or so, 1 in 4 Japanese homes will be powered by a Hydrogen fuel cell. They currently cost $30K but the Japanese subsidies 50% of the cost, giving families a $15K credit.

In Germany, the so-called "feed-in" laws not only subsidize solar and wind technology but also force power companies to purchase excess private energy at market rates. Meaning, if my house creates more solar and wind power than I need, my local provider must buy it from me.

Are such ideas in the new Cap & Trade legislation or not?

Sensible legislation is sensible. Whodathunkit.

Too bad our government is so gridlocked that something smart and easy to pass will end up being gridlocked by partisans.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

Someone has their tin foil hat on too tight lately. Is this you...

How do you figure its not true. Has that not been the startling trending for the past 10-20-30 years? The american dream of give me a chance and I'll make it on my own has been replaced with give me handout so I can sit on my couch.

 

[drebo]

The way you get it developed to affordability is to subsidize it early on.

Uhm, no?

The way something gets developed to affordability is by that product representing a clear and demonstrably better solution than what's currently out there. If solar and wind were demonstrably better and more efficient than nuclear*, coal, natural gas, and large hydroelectric, then it would have already been developed into affordability.

And don't give me this "better for the environment" crap, either. Nuclear is infinitely better for the environment than both wind and solar, and yet it is not encouraged by the government. Nay, it is in fact regulated to the point where it is just barely able to compete and completely unable to expand. If we really wanted to do away with "dirty" electrical generation, we would be embracing nuclear, not destroying habitats by planting solar and wind farms.

Nuclear is vastly cheaper, much more reliable, and produces orders of magnitude more energy per unit of land.

By the government regulating things over which it has no Constitutional jurisdiction, we are instead forced to cope with less efficient and more hazardous forms of energy production.

You've got it backwards: subsidies are BAD for progress, not good for it.

 

[Sinsear]

the american dream of give me a chance and i'll make it on my own has been replaced with give me handout so i can sit on my couch.

qft!!!

 

[RyanPaulShaffer]

Ho ho ho, Green Jobs Czar!

 

[Sinsear]

Create Millions of New Green Jobs

/lie

 

[Robor]

How do you figure its not true. Has that not been the startling trending for the past 10-20-30 years? The american dream of give me a chance and I'll make it on my own has been replaced with give me handout so I can sit on my couch.

Do you have proof of this organized government plan to make the populace dependent on them?

 

[Genx87]

The way you get it developed to affordability is to subsidize it early on.

Define early on. The govt has been subsidizing wind and solar for over 30 years and it still isnt affordable.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

Do you have proof of this organized government plan to make the populace dependent on them?

Do you have proof otherwise?