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Non-Tech : Kirk's Market Thoughts -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kirk © who wrote (633)	2/7/2014 11:39:08 AM
From: Sam	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 26795

The media aren't paying much attention, but in recent weeks Europe has decided to run, not walk, as fast as it can away from the economic menace of green energy.... Why not try a different approach to energy policy? Get rid of all taxpayer subsidies for energy — oil, gas, wind and solar power, biofuels, electric-battery-operated cars and others — and create a true level playing field where every energy source competes on efficiency and cost rather than political/corporate favoritism? It figures that IBD would take the angle that the EU is "running" away from alternative energies. The answer to their question in the second paragraph above is that they aren't "running" away at all, what they are doing is sensible if you believe (as I do) that natural gas is a necessary bridge to a time when the storage problem for solar in particular but alternative energies in general is resolved. It is far better than coal.

To: Kirk © who wrote (633)	2/10/2014 6:40:49 PM
From: llap	1 Recommendation Recommended By 3bar Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 26795

Agreed. In my native Germany the green energy created a nasty energy cost explosion, grid reliability issues and the absurd situation where poor tenants subsidized rich homeowners' and farmers' energy costs. This is a complete nightmare, of course garnered with the hypocrisy of pointing the finger to the US. To give you some background on the German (and also European) mentality, let's look at what the culture wars are about here and there. In the US, the culture war which emerged in the late 70s is largely around things like abortion, gun control, religious topics like creationism vs. evolution, women's rights etc. - what you see on Fox and MSNBC, for example, ad nauseum. In Germany, the culture war which emerged a few years later is more about environmentalism. Formal religion and its derivatives are not a big topic in Europe. The anti nuclear power movement in Germany has everything of a manic religious awakening movement, though. This includes major hypocrisy ;-) It's all there. To understand green energy in Germany or Scandinavia means to understand that it's the centerpiece of the Culture War there. There is nothing rational about the Green Energy movement there just as there is nothing rational about the Religious Right here.