Tax relief on sustainability

[gsport george]

....Wonderful, enforced non-greenness and impoverishment. Guess why I'm not pro-nannying....

Except when it comes to Nuclear? That is "nannied" enormously...

Sure the alternatives arent "ready to go" right now, I never said they were. But they never will be if we dont support them.
Installing PV in Spain, on commercial buildings (that use most of their power during daylight hours) is hardly THAT unecconomic....

George

 

[NT]

....Wonderful, enforced non-greenness and impoverishment. Guess why I'm not pro-nannying....

Except when it comes to Nuclear? That is "nannied" enormously...

All our energy generation is subject to endless nannying. Not sure what that has to do with which one is our best bet.

Installing PV in Spain, on commercial buildings (that use most of their power during daylight hours) is hardly THAT unecconomic....

its folly, economic and green foolishness.


NT

 

[biffvernon]

TOD:Europe[/url]"]British Energy Group Plc, the country's largest power producer, ousted the head of nuclear operations and said production will miss forecasts by at least 8.2 percent a year because of faulty reactors.
Annual production will be no less than 5 terawatt hours lower until at least March 2008.

Six of British Energy's 16 reactors are shut, with four down because of cracked boiler tubes. Production at two of its plants, which generate enough electricity to supply some 2.4 million homes, will be restricted for at least the next 16 months. This may undermine government efforts to promote building new reactors to replace aging units.

British Energy has 38 percent of its nuclear capacity out of service, or 3,620 megawatts from a total of 9,568 megawatts.

Full story from Bloomberg
Those nuclear power stations will be regarded as period properties soon. And with all those cracks it looks as though they should have been built out of lime

 

[NT]

I cant help but wonder if youre trying to lead people to false conclusions here.

Just in case, faults occur with all types of plant, and for any gen technology there will be a time somewhere in its life when more than average plants are under repair, by definition. And of course such things are monitored, there are always backup systems and so on. Its just part of the working of any large plant.


NT

 

[NT]

How does money relate to energy when you can choose between 2 different prices for the very same item?

6 answers...


1. Business costs differ from one company to another. Company efficiency may differ, size may differ, equipment and methods used may differ, staff qualifications may differ, transport costs may differ and so on. So identical products can have diferent prices and different total embodied energy.


2. Guarantees, levels of reliability, durability, toxicity of materials and so on may all differ, so an apparently identical or comparable product is often not identical or comparable.


3. When one business charges 200 and another 300, one often finds the cheaper producer sells in greater quantity, thus business costs are divided among more products. The 300 seller may sell less and spend more on advertising, hence the different prices charged still reflect the energy behind each product - even if the products themselves are identical, or comparable.


4. There are always sellers trying to offer identical or equivalent products with above normal profit margins. In a market where buyers see both products, many times the cheaper one is bought and the higher priced item is not. In these cases the lower priced one is the realistic price, and the higher price just an attempt at optimism.


5. This system works the most accurately in balanced markets, ie where grossly excessive profit margins are not being charged. In the occasional case with immature or unbalanced markets where sale price can occasionally pay all costs many times over, the excess profit gets spent in one way or another, and thus purchases energy, either directly or more often indirectly.

Why & how does excess profit always get spent?

a. Spending on goods is simple enough
b. spending on services is too
c. spending on investment means energy is purchased indirectly.
d. saving in an account also results in spending, in that the money saved is used by the bank to float new businesses, ie purchase energy indirectly.


6. There is also another way in which sometimes excessive prices do reflect real energy input, even in an unbalanced immature market. An example of this would be the DARPA robotic car trials, where the winning entrant received $2,000,000 for their robot, and other entrants received nothing. In this case, producing the winning robot did not take only one team's efforts, but rather the efforts of many teams. (To put it another way, no-one knew who would be the winner ahead of time.) Hence the price tag that was many times the one team's costs.

http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/october12/stanleyfinish-100905.html


NT

 

[Nemesis]

Is this now ended?

Or are you all just pausing for breath?

 

[Gervase]

Sshh!

 

[Penners]

Please God, make it go away.

 

[Moo]

Is this a record length for a thread?

I've not been following it (way above my intellectual level), but have enjoyed counting the pages.

 

[Penners]

Is this a record length for a thread?

No, don't! You'll only encourage them to try for a world record!

 

[skier-hughes]

Aha, the world record currently stands at 5,158 pages..... so in order to keep this going,


Can you just explain that again for me NT... how about the fluctuation in currency, how does that effect the gross overall energy cost.



I'm also going to start a one man survey on the energy consumed in the production of babies, now any volunteers to help me out ladies...........

 

[Penners]

Can you just explain that again for me NT... how about the fluctuation in currency, how does that effect the gross overall energy cost.



I'm also going to start a one man survey on the energy consumed in the production of babies, now any volunteers to help me out ladies...........

Graham - behave!

 

[skier-hughes]

I'm hoping to get a grant from the government as well, it's a serious business this you know.

 

[NT]

Aha, the world record currently stands at 5,158 pages..... so in order to keep this going,

Ouch! Biggest I've seen / partaken in was around 2000 posts. So be warned lol.

Can you just explain that again for me NT... how about the fluctuation in currency, how does that effect the gross overall energy cost.

What exactly do you mean by fluctuation of currency? Inflation? Exchange rates? Local variations? Or...? Then I'll see if I can. Not promising tho!

I'm also going to start a one man survey on the energy consumed in the production of babies, now any volunteers to help me out ladies...........

Reckon you'll die of exhaustion and poverty.


NT

 

[Penners]

Reckon you'll die of exhaustion

If this thread qoes on much longer, I reckon we all will.

 

[skier-hughes]

[

Can you just explain that again for me NT... how about the fluctuation in currency, how does that effect the gross overall energy cost.

What exactly do you mean by fluctuation of currency? Inflation? Exchange rates? Local variations? Or...? Then I'll see if I can. Not promising tho!

NT

Actually I was just jesting, but thinking about it, the first two could have an effect couldn't they, but surely my pound is worth just as much as Penner's or is he better off than me with his £1 living in Suffolk rather than Staffordshire

 

[NT]

[

Can you just explain that again for me NT... how about the fluctuation in currency, how does that effect the gross overall energy cost.

What exactly do you mean by fluctuation of currency? Inflation? Exchange rates? Local variations? Or...? Then I'll see if I can. Not promising tho!

NT

Actually I was just jesting, but thinking about it, the first two could have an effect couldn't they,

Inflation has a huge effect. What was a pound originally, a pound of silver or gold? Whatever it was, its worth a tiny fraction of what it was centuries ago. So yes the ratio of money to energy creeps slowly over the years.

but surely my pound is worth just as much as Penner's or is he better off than me with his £1 living in Suffolk rather than Staffordshire

When I lived in place A I could buy more for my money than in place B. And the people in place A earnt less than in place B. In A people used less total energy per person, due to being poorer, hence I was buying a smiliar amount of energy with my £1 in both places, but a differing amount of goods.

Take an example, lets say I live in some posh area where the council spends millions planting flowers, cleaning streets daily and so on. My £1 buys less goods, but the same total energy.

Now if I live in slumland instead, £1 gets more goods because there is less total energy expended for each good purchased. Less rubbish disposal, stuf is left lying around, less street cleaning, no flower planting, less spent on H&S, etc.

Not sure how clear that is, we'll see.

when I bought goods in the rich area, part of the cost went towards all those public costs, and the private business costs of all the work needed to comply with H&S. When I bought goods in the cheaper area, not much of that price tag went to steet cleaning, there was almost no H&S enforcement, and so on.


Exchange rates... just the agreed equivalent value of 2 different money units. Each economy develops and reacts independantly and differently, hence energy use per person varies separately, hence exchange rate varies accordingly.

Lets test that back-of-envelopely. Say the economy in Russia declines, people have to make various cutbacks, and spend less and use less energy per person. At the same time, the rouble will fall in value, indicating that one rouble now represents less energy expenditure than it did. Seems to stand up ok.


NT

 

[NT]

Is this now ended?

Or are you all just pausing for breath?

erm....



We were just getting started Nemesis


NT

 

[Nemesis]

The end of the world is obviously nigh.

For what it's worth, I think nuclear is a disaster, and wind turbines at the moment in many places ditto.

But - they are making a vast amount of cash for some, so that's OK then.

Carry on - I may drop in and out of this thread in the months to come, or there again...

 

[NT]

I may drop in and out of this thread in the months to come

lol

NT