We recently wrote about the insights shared by energy trends analyst Chris Namovicz of the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), who spoke at our "Communicating Energy" lecture series recently, and his comments regarding the lack of a definitive count on fossil fuel subsidies in this country. Today, we return to Namovicz's lecture, this time to ask him about the economics of fossil fuel companies' exploitation of resources on public property.
Here's our question:
Their price drops in part because we're not charging them to ruin public property. I mean, we basically are letting them contaminate water, we don't charge them for that, and they don't have to pay it. Your assumptions don't include any price we would impose on them for hurting public waterways, is that accurate?
Now, here's Namovicz's response:
I think it's easier to figure out the costs to mitigate the issue than it is to figure out the value of mitigation... [or of the loss of an asset], right.
That includes "damages from climate change (like weather events and rising seas, public health damages from toxins released during electricity generation, deaths from rail accidents during coal transport, public health problems in coal-mining regions (in Appalachia, mountaintop removal contaminates surface and groundwater with carcinogens and heavy metals), government subsidies, and lost value of abandoned mine areas." And that's just coal. The same type of analysis can and should be done for oil and natural gas, as well, with what you can expect to be similarly eye-popping results.
When the dirty energy lobby makes the Palin-esque claim that it's not really subsidized, or hardly at all, it's OK to laugh, or admire them for working so hard to believe their own nonsense. But it's important to point out that it's a lie, and a big one at that. The fact is, the direct and indirect underwriting to this industry -- including an almost complete failure to account for damages to public land, water, and health -- has been wildly underestimated, not overestimated.
In stark contrast, clean energy doesn't engage in wholesale wreckage of public property. We keep reading about the devastation caused by oil spills, natural gas "fracking," mountaintop removal coal mining, etc. because we are renting our property to bad renters -- people who aren't charged a market rate, don't give a security deposit, and who can absolutely counted on to wreck the house. Maybe a deficit-conscious country could do better.
Follow Mike Casey on Twitter: www.twitter.com/scalinggreen
For instance, the hotel industry. Shouldn't the cost of this industry include the cost of (for instance) the GHG release of their energy usage, the environmental costs of the chemicals they use (cleaning, mainentance, etc.), the environmental costs of their water usage and treatment?
Or the medical industry, under this externalized cost theory, should the cost of that industry include the GHG numbers from their energy usage, the costs of dealing with biohazardous materials, the costs of dealing with the chemicals they use, etc., etc., ??
I admit I'm new to this externalized cost accounting but I never see any industry but the energy industry to which this is applied. Can anyone point me to a primer on how externalized costs are to be accounted, and their application to other industries?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly_ash_slurry_spill
with respect, that is just totally wrong. the same Big Energy failure to account for destroyed ecosystem services applies equally to all Big Energy projects sited in our open spaces. Big Solar, Big Wind and their Big Transmission all destroy HUGE swathes of open (taxpayer owned) space and remove that land from all other uses including habitat, recreation and CO2 sequestration. Big Solar also severely depletes scarce desert groundwater and creates huge erosion and sandstorm issues that will devastate surrounding land as well. you really need to read the project EIS and the comments to them before you make blanket statements about how harmless they are.
In fact, for every "fast tracked" Big Solar permit so far, the permitting agency has said "yes, this will totally destroy the area, emit a ton of GHGs and kill off a bunch of endangered species but because CA has an RPS (and/or Dick Cheney's 2005 Energy Policy Act proposed siting 10,000 MW of "renewable" energy on public lands), we will OVERRIDE all the destruction, ignore CEQA and NEPA and permit it anyhow." which is why they are getting sued!
That said, I am glad you are bringing this point up, since it corresponds exactly with my position that we need to site solar power WITHIN THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT and stop killing wilderness for ANY Big Energy projects, even those being greenwashed by industry! Go feed in tariffs!