Regarding yesterday’s thread about alternate energy sources, there are always complex factors that obscure the problems. For example, I believe that it takes something like 20 years for a solar cell to pay off the energy debt encured in its manufacture.
IMHO we should let the market solve the problem. That’s what markets are for. Raise the price of energy, gasoline, electricity, etc. to their true value including geopolitical risks, polution, and ultimate depletion, and a thousand smart people and companies will go to work to find better answers. I wouldn’t be surprized to find that the best solutions are not among the ones we are debating.
IMHO this is also a better way to promote energy effeciency than passing laws regulating car mileage.
Politically it might be hard on whoever tried to impliment this, however. Hard to explain to someone filling up on the way to work that he’s paying some part of the cost of keeping the middle east sweet. |