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Carbon emissions

What energy does China use to produce solar panels for the rest of the world? Coal. A new mutation of capitalists.
 
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Remember that part of the civilized world is behind us in a lot of things. The EU depends on coal, gas, and wood for more than 40% of its electricity (they need a bit more civilizing), and about 15% of that is still coal. That's 4x the burn of Ontario, and we use zero coal.

They are heading in the right direction, though: Wind and solar generated a record 22% of EU electricity in 2022

And yes, Ontario and Quebec have done well.

Other developed economies are also on the way to phasing out coal, and increasing renewables.

Does carbon tax work? I doubt it, I think regulation and incentives are less punishing and more effective.

Ask yourself how much your carbon footprint has dropped since you started paying $500/year in direct taxes, and added another 6 cents/dollar onto everything you buy (average for an Ontarian). Perhaps detail it in a posting.

OK, so what sort of miraculous regulation do you propose that somehow achieves the objectives while not costing tax dollars and somehow also not restricting consumer choice?? The incentive has to be a push in the right direction.

Personally:
All commonly used lights in the house are LED. There's a few legacy incandescents but they are either seldom used, or routinely used but only for short periods.
I have an electric lawnmower - the old skool extension cord type, because I have a small city lot.
My daily-driver car is an EV. I have combustion-engine motorcycles, and my bike-hauler van is a combustion-engine model that is about 10 years old. It was chosen for being the most efficient of its type at the time that made economic sense (diesels went off the list as soon as they started needing 4 different catalytic converters and 2 EGR systems in order to comply with emission standards and at a $6000 premium that did not make sense.) I do not plan to buy another internal combustion engine.
When the furnace is done (and it's 20 years old, along with the air conditioner) it's getting replaced with a heat pump.
 
While it pains me to give credit to China, they are doubling own on electric propulsion which has an initial big investment in carbon, but a reasonable payoff after about 150,000KM.
They are heading in the right direction, though: Wind and solar generated a record 22% of EU electricity in 2022

And yes, Ontario and Quebec have done well.

Other developed economies are also on the way to phasing out coal, and increasing renewables.



OK, so what sort of miraculous regulation do you propose that somehow achieves the objectives while not costing tax dollars and somehow also not restricting consumer choice?? The incentive has to be a push in the right direction.

Personally:
All commonly used lights in the house are LED. There's a few legacy incandescents but they are either seldom used, or routinely used but only for short periods.
I have an electric lawnmower - the old skool extension cord type, because I have a small city lot.
My daily-driver car is an EV. I have combustion-engine motorcycles, and my bike-hauler van is a combustion-engine model that is about 10 years old. It was chosen for being the most efficient of its type at the time that made economic sense (diesels went off the list as soon as they started needing 4 different catalytic converters and 2 EGR systems in order to comply with emission standards and at a $6000 premium that did not make sense.) I do not plan to buy another internal combustion engine.
When the furnace is done (and it's 20 years old, along with the air conditioner) it's getting replaced with a heat pump.
My question is… did the carbon tax drive your behaviour?

Seems to me the decision you have made are technology and TCO that have been driven by regulation has motivated you?
 
This process uses a lot of energy: producing 1 kilogram of metallurgical grade silicon requires 14-16 kWh of power, which is roughly equivalent to using your home oven for seven hours. Still, over their lifetimes, solar panels emit 25 times less carbon dioxide equivalent per kilowatt hour than coal-powered electricity.
So we ran our oven for 7 hours and have had 14 years of solar electricity. :rolleyes:

Coal is not the only source of electrical power in China - 43% is from renewables,
In 2023, China's total installed electric generation capacity was 2.92 TW, of which 1.26 TW renewable, including 376 GW from wind power and 425 GW from solar power. The rest was mostly coal capacity, with 1040 GW in 2019. Nuclear also plays an increasing role in the national electricity sector.
Be careful - China went into extreme lock down over three years of the pandemic so stats on emissions will be altered by that.
 
Mike
My question is… did the carbon tax drive your behaviour?
Why should a carbon tax drive behavior? It puts a long overdue cost on carbon polluting.
You can decide what course to take to reduce that cost for yourself.
You can pay for your pollution or take steps to reduce it.

The FF industry has had a free and subsidized ride for 100 years.....that's over.....but far too slowly.
 
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Carbon pricing in principle could work but it cannot be a flat tax across the income spectrum like it currently is.

Carbon pricing changes little behaviour if you can afford to ignore it. Do the affluent drive smaller more efficient cars or live in smaller homes or vacation or travel less to the cottage or chalet?
Oh they may purchase an EV as a second car or add a heat pump to boast that they are doing something for the environment.

The current flat tax punishes those (working class and working poor) who cannot afford the increased costs in the economy for food, living and transportation,

The revenue collected must be used to incentive innovation but without government entanglement.
Government my set the objectives and reward tax credits for results but keep them out of designing the solutions.
 
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Carbon pricing in principle could work but it cannot be a flat tax across the income spectrum like it currently is.

What we have in Canada isn't a flat tax, due to the rebate involved. The amount you pay is in proportion to the carbon used, but the rebate is set regardless. This means lower-income people are taxed less, because they generally use less fuel (not so many ocean cruises and flights on airplanes to distant places) but they get the same rebate.

Carbon pricing changes little behaviour if you can afford to ignore it. Do the affluent drive smaller more efficient cars or live in smaller homes or vacation or travel less to the cottage or chalet?
Oh they may purchase an EV as a second car or add a heat pump to boast that they are doing something for the environment.

The current flat tax punishes those (working class and working poor) who cannot afford the increased costs in the economy for food, living and transportation,

The revenue collected must be used to incentive innovation but without government entanglement.
Government my set the objectives and reward tax credits for results but keep them out of designing the solutions.

That's the beauty of a carbon tax and rebate scheme. It keeps the government OUT of designing solutions. Use less fossil fuel? You pay less tax. Ideally it's agnostic to HOW you use less fossil fuel.

I would like to hear suggestions from those opposed to the carbon tax, for how to achieve comparable-or-better results, without having the government pick technologies to support (which means they're designing the solutions), and without spending the tax money that the right-wing folks are so loath to do.

There ARE legislative things that we ought to be doing. Some are in the works, some are kinda-sorta-there but not really, some the government folks are not onto yet.
- Any new-construction house needs to be pre-wired for 240VAC minimum 50-amp circuit to either the garage or to an outdoor receptacle in its parking area.
- Any new-construction residential parking lot (apartment buildings etc) needs to be pre-wired for EV charging, and LOTS of it. A 120V receptacle at every parking spot, for example. (It's enough for most people, if the car is plugged into 120V overnight) Or a CCS2 receptacle set up for 240V 16A minimum at every parking spot. (I'm intentionally picking low charging currents to keep total building demand within sight. Slow-charging like this is enough for most people ... if nothing else, enough after a couple hours to get the vehicle to a fast-charger)
- Any new parking meter intended for on-street parking needs to have a built-in switched 120V or CCS2 240V 16A receptacle.
- Any major construction project on any street that is intended for on-street residential parking should involve retrofitting it for slow-charging EVs, either by parking meters or receptacles available for use streetside or any other imaginative solutions you can think of to accomplish this.
- Incentives for retail businesses to install, AND MAINTAIN, DC fast-charging equipment for their customers to use.

The new SAE J3400 standard provides for a "bring your own cable" AC charging solution similar to what's done in Europe ... the receptacle is the same as CCS2, this avoids the cables hanging all over the place when they're not in use, and it transfers the responsibility for not damaging the cable or the plug to the end user because the cable is theirs. We need to make use of that.
 
I do not plan to buy another internal combustion engine.
They'll probably screw it up and/or not offer it here but I hadn't heard of this option before.

Morris-JE-Side-view.jpg


Morris-Commercial-Morris-JE.jpg
 
Carbon pricing in principle could work but it cannot be a flat tax across the income spectrum like it currently is.

Carbon pricing changes little behaviour if you can afford to ignore it. Do the affluent drive smaller more efficient cars or live in smaller homes or vacation or travel less to the cottage or chalet?
Oh they may purchase an EV as a second car or add a heat pump to boast that they are doing something for the environment.

The current flat tax punishes those (working class and working poor) who cannot afford the increased costs in the economy for food, living and transportation,

The revenue collected must be used to incentive innovation but without government entanglement.
Government my set the objectives and reward tax credits for results but keep them out of designing the solutions.
Thank you.

It seems all the rules and planning is set by the well-to-do. Translate that to the lower income groups who are becoming more radicalized over housing costs, food costs and transportation costs.

We have a PM who was born into power and wealth.

We have a premier that was born into wealth with some side gigs

We have a mayor that largely dictates traffic flow around the GTA but she doesn't drive or have to commute from north Scarborough.

Our civil servants earn more than the masses they are supposed to be serving.

Radicalizing : Rent strikes, cash for keys, food banks, tent cities in public parks
 
What we have in Canada isn't a flat tax, due to the rebate involved. The amount you pay is in proportion to the carbon used, but the rebate is set regardless. This means lower-income people are taxed less, because they generally use less fuel (not so many ocean cruises and flights on airplanes to distant places) but they get the same rebate.



That's the beauty of a carbon tax and rebate scheme. It keeps the government OUT of designing solutions. Use less fossil fuel? You pay less tax. Ideally it's agnostic to HOW you use less fossil fuel.

I would like to hear suggestions from those opposed to the carbon tax, for how to achieve comparable-or-better results, without having the government pick technologies to support (which means they're designing the solutions), and without spending the tax money that the right-wing folks are so loath to do.

There ARE legislative things that we ought to be doing. Some are in the works, some are kinda-sorta-there but not really, some the government folks are not onto yet.
- Any new-construction house needs to be pre-wired for 240VAC minimum 50-amp circuit to either the garage or to an outdoor receptacle in its parking area.
- Any new-construction residential parking lot (apartment buildings etc) needs to be pre-wired for EV charging, and LOTS of it. A 120V receptacle at every parking spot, for example. (It's enough for most people, if the car is plugged into 120V overnight) Or a CCS2 receptacle set up for 240V 16A minimum at every parking spot. (I'm intentionally picking low charging currents to keep total building demand within sight. Slow-charging like this is enough for most people ... if nothing else, enough after a couple hours to get the vehicle to a fast-charger)
- Any new parking meter intended for on-street parking needs to have a built-in switched 120V or CCS2 240V 16A receptacle.
- Any major construction project on any street that is intended for on-street residential parking should involve retrofitting it for slow-charging EVs, either by parking meters or receptacles available for use streetside or any other imaginative solutions you can think of to accomplish this.
- Incentives for retail businesses to install, AND MAINTAIN, DC fast-charging equipment for their customers to use.

The new SAE J3400 standard provides for a "bring your own cable" AC charging solution similar to what's done in Europe ... the receptacle is the same as CCS2, this avoids the cables hanging all over the place when they're not in use, and it transfers the responsibility for not damaging the cable or the plug to the end user because the cable is theirs. We need to make use of that.
Copper theft is shutting down a lot of charge points in the USA. It's a lot of work for the $$ they get. Apparently good scrap prices for wind turbine ground wires as well.
 
Mike

Why should a carbon tax drive behavior? It puts a long overdue cost on carbon polluting.
You can decide what course to take to reduce that cost for yourself.
You can pay for your pollution or take steps to reduce it.

The FF industry has had a free and subsidized ride for 100 years.....that's over.....but far too slowly.
Shifting from fifth to first is hard on the drive train. Shifting from fifth to neutral and letting inertia do the job has problems as well.

A high ranking government official told me years ago a major change in policies that would affect the general population had to be done slowly to allow for people to adjust. For example a big change in CPP or OAS.

However it seems a lot of the changes we are facing are being shoved down our throats. In eleven years we'll all be driving EV's. B.S.

Technology will help make the new stuff better but at the same time make the present stuff obsolete. What's a five year old computer worth? Why would a car be different as technology improves?

Leasing would be a great idea but the lease rate would include massive depreciation.
 
Copper theft is shutting down a lot of charge points in the USA. It's a lot of work for the $$ they get. Apparently good scrap prices for wind turbine ground wires as well.
Ground wires are a lot safer to steal than hv cable (and more likely to be copper instead of aluminium).

Copper theft in Kenya was so bad that they have almost given up on landlines for phones. Cell is their default infrastructure. Incoming is free so poor people call richer people and hangup before it connects, richer people call back. Keeps cost to poor people close to zero.
 
Fiber Internet service has been going down like Freeland's cocaine-high every few weeks; sometimes every few days here in South Frontenac and that's JUST South Frontenac. Bell lashed alot of the fiber trunks to their existing copper assets (which essentially is being done sly on government tax dollars, because the fact is that the copper cabling is badly aged and needs replacing regardless of what fiber can do for the customer) to save money on the installs.

And despite all that, Bell announced last week that they are losing a lot of money on rural Internet. The cost is too high for fiber, which is something I preached to the government for literally a decade, but got exactly nowhere. I spoke with Gudie Hutchings face to face about this, and boy did her face change when I told her that they have to replace all their copper assets, no matter what it is that they replace it with (cellular is an option, folks...) and so the government is essentially paying for Bell to replace their old, useless cables. Some of those analog trunks are down to 30% wire capacity and there are many underground areas that need to be pumped just for Bell to do any maintenance on them, all over Ontario.

Sorry ................. segue. That post just triggered me, lol
 


I would like to hear suggestions from those opposed to the carbon tax, for how to achieve comparable-or-better results, without having the government pick technologies to support (which means they're designing the solutions), and without spending the tax money that the right-wing folks are so loath to do.
I’ll bite. But first I’d like to hear a few examples of where carbon tax has itself driven carbon saving behaviour.

Then I’ll toss out a few ideas
 
Carbon tax = fossil fuel price = an influencing factor in, for example, whether someone picks an enormous gas-guzzling SUV to drive themselves to and from work, or the compact car which is all they actually need. Every time there's a fuel supply crunch, the resulting spike in prices has temporarily changed consumer behaviour. The 1973 crunch drove auto manufacturers to downsize in the late 1970s. The 1979 crunch led to people switching to imports and downsized vehicles again. And, a couple years after the crisis subsides, consumers forget ...

Right now, California has the highest fuel prices in mainland USA and it's by a rather significant amount (reference: AAA Gas Prices ). California also has the highest EV market penetration, 28.1% as of Q3 2023 (reference: https://www.autosinnovate.org/posts/press-release/2023-q3-get-connected-press-release ). I submit that although there are other factors at work (described in article), this is not a coincidence.

Prices influence behaviour.

Now, let's hear even a HINT of how to get people to change their habits otherwise.
 
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California also has the highest EV market penetration, 28.1% as of Q3 2023

That's not because of gas prices. People really affected by and worried about gas prices cant afford the cost of a new tesla. Carbon tax is just another kill the middle and lower class in the west scheme.
 

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