Standard Renewable Energy

Presidential Election Questions?
Hi- I have a few questions relating to Energy and Environment for the 2008 presidential election. I ALWAYS choose a best answer for all of you people who want to earn points. Please no rude or off-the-topic answers. I also know both sides of the election to, so I don't need to know 'who's better'. Thanks! Questions- -Could you give me a definition of Automobile Mileage Standards? -Could you give me a definition of Zero Carbon and Green Gas Emissions? -Could you give me a definition of nuclear fuel rods? -Could you give me a definition of Efficiency Standards, Renewable Energy, and International Repository? You don't have to answer all of them, just the ones you know. Allygirl

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Blood and Gore. Can you believe that Al Gore's carbon credit trading company has that name?
You people are being led like sheep to the slaughterhouse with Al Gore's mindless carbon nonsense: The Money and Connections Behind Al Gore?s Carbon Crusade by Deborah Corey Barnes 10/03/2007 Al Gore?s campaign against global warming is shifting into high gear. Reporters and commentators follow his every move and bombard the public with notice of his activities and opinions. But while the mainstream media promote his ideas about the state of planet Earth, they are mostly silent about the dramatic impact his economic proposals would have on America. And journalists routinely ignore evidence that he may personally benefit from his programs. Would the romance fizzle if Gore?s followers realized how much their man stands to gain? Earlier this year Gore experienced a notable public relations debacle. The Tennessee Center for Policy Research, a state think tank, revealed that he was an energy hog. Public records show that Gore?s Nashville mansion used in one month more than twice the electricity the typical American household uses in a year: His average monthly electric bill was more than $1,359. Moreover, Gore?s household energy use increased after An Inconvenient Truth, his film about global warming, was released to ecstatic reviews. Never mind that the scientific community is divided over what causes global warming, how bad it is and how to deal with it. Gore plays Chicken Little to the media?s applause, insisting that the world is warming dangerously and that he has the solution. The ?Cap-and-Trade? System To resolve the ?climate crisis,? Gore wants to put a cap on the production of greenhouse gases. He calls for an immediate freeze on U.S. emissions, a ban on new coal-fired power plants, tough new fuel-economy and energy-efficiency standards, renewable energy mandates, carbon taxes and mandatory targets and timetables for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Those emissions consist mostly of carbon dioxide (CO2), the byproduct of fossil fuels such as oil, coal and natural gas, which supply 85% of all U.S. energy. Gore?s blueprint to save the planet moves the United States towards a command economy in which government regulators hold sway over what kinds and amounts of energy will be made available to the private sector. His principal regulatory tool is what?s called carbon-credit trading. Under a so-called ?cap-and-trade? system, government places a ceiling or ?cap? on private-sector emissions of CO2 and other ?greenhouse gases.? Each sector, industry or business is allocated a fixed quantity of carbon credits that allow it to emit specific quantities of greenhouse gases. As an example, one tradable carbon credit might permit the emission of one ton of CO2. If a business emits more tons of CO2 than its supply of credits allows, it has the option to buy surplus credits from other firms -- or it will have to pay a fine in proportion to the amount of the excess emission. By contrast, businesses that emit less than their allocation can sell their excess credits. This system, which may sound market-friendly, is something only a bureaucrat could dream up. The twist is that the carbon market exists only because the government?s imposition of a cap creates an artificial scarcity in the right to produce energy. In a cap-and-trade system, buyers will purchase their offsets from a broker or through an electronic trading platform. In Europe, carbon trading is already a reality. Since 2005, carbon offsets have been traded electronically on the European Climate Exchange (ECX). Most carbon cap-and-trade programs also allow regulated entities to earn credits by taking actions that supposedly reduce emissions outside of the firm?s facilities or operations. In one popular version of the carbon-offset concept, firms earn credits by buying seedling trees for planting in less-developed countries. Supporters claim the CO2 intake of the trees will balance out the carbon emissions of the sponsoring firm?s industrial activity. Despite its public relations value, scientists scoff at the notion that it?s possible to plant enough trees to balance out man?s production of CO2. But carbon-offset projects are popular in the environmentalist community. More Chances to Cheat However, the most radical environmentalists reject cap-and-trade. They say it allows polluters to continue to pollute by purchasing carbon credits. That is true but irrelevant. A ton of CO2 emitted in Beijing has the same climatologic effect as a ton emitted in New York. The real problem is that every country?s government has an incentive to cheat on behalf of its domestic producers. This has been the European Union?s (EU) experience with the Emissions Trading System (ETS) that the EU established to implement the Kyoto Protocol. In just about every EU country except Britain, the credits allowed exceed the corresponding tons of emissions. Carbon offsets provide even more opportunities to cheat. For example, some aluminum com

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Ahh Starbuck you've done it again?
This is what I started and California will take back the state from radical environmentalists. November elections will see a lot of this hoax just disappear and guess what the world will still be here going through its natural processes. Hopefully this will end these radicals reign for a long time. (12-20) 04:00 PST Copenhagen - -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and a swarm of California officials came to the U.N. climate summit last week to brag about their state's accomplishments and show foreigners that it is the cutting edge of U.S. action to curb emissions. But like President Obama, they got caught in a train wreck of discord in the 13-day meeting that ended Saturday, as the 193 nations present agreed only to "take note" of a U.S.-brokered, nonbinding statement of intentions that glossed over the world's differences on who should shoulder which responsibilities in the fight against climate change. The diplomatic clash set up a catch-22 for California. The inconclusive results of the climate negotiations have made the state's leadership in climate policy all the more important. California's aggressive actions on auto emission standards, renewable energy, building weatherization and solar panels are encouraging other states and cities in the United States and around the globe to plunge ahead with their own similar policies. But the stalemate in Copenhagen may also increase the political risk in California, where resistance to the state's climate policies is gathering force. "A train wreck always raises concerns," said Sen. Fran Pavley, D-Agoura Hills (Los Angeles County), who wrote the state's landmark climate-change law in 2006 and was one of the state's leaders in Copenhagen. "It fuels the argument that because of the recession we can't move forward," she said. "The opposition has used the recession to try to do a general rollback, and they may do that here with this." Pavley and other state officials worry that failure of the U.N. climate negotiations will embolden opponents who hope to roll back California's climate policies in next year's election. Ballot measure Conservatives, led by Assemblyman Dan Logue, R-Linda (Yuba County), Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Granite Bay (Placer County), and anti-tax advocate Ted Costa, have submitted to the attorney general an initiative for the November ballot that would freeze the state's compliance with its own climate mandate, the 2006 law known as AB32. GOP gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman has pledged to suspend compliance with the law immediately if elected. "People who are trying to use AB32 in next year's election will use any negative result out of Copenhagen," said Mary Nichols, chairwoman of the California Air Resources Board, the powerful agency that is drawing up the web of regulations that will enforce the bill. "They already believe they've caught something they can use to get people to the polls." California officials have been traveling to climate summits and other diplomatic venues for several years to boast about their track record. By nearly any standard, their pride is well earned. The state is viewed far and wide as a leader in climate policies such as AB32. In the past year, Schwarzenegger has signed several climate agreements with foreign state, provincial and municipal governments, including: -- An agreement with 10 other states in Brazil, Indonesia and the United States to work jointly to protect tropical forests, possibly creating tradeable offsets for California's cap-and-trade program. -- A partnership with the U.N. Development Program to offer technical assistance to Africa for low-carbon development. -- A partnership with Jiangsu Province in China to share policy know-how and to cooperate on technology. It is the first state-level agreement between China and the United States to work together to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But the crucial phase comes next year, when the air board must release its plans to implement AB32, which is intended to reduce the state's greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. "If this conference does not get a strong agreement, some will say that Copenhagen has failed, that we talk grandly but we are fooling ourselves," and that much like in the fairy tale, the emperor has no clothes, the Republican governor told a news conference Tuesday. "Perhaps the real success is to give us the opportunity to think differently again. Perhaps the success comes in realizing that something different needs to be done and in fact is already being done." Many experts agree. "AB32 is a real leadership issue," said Peter Miller, senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council in San Francisco. "Now that the federal process has slowed, California is more important. It's the same here in Copenhagen. If the forward movement slows, there will be more weight on the sub-national actors." Some studies show that approximately half the overall U.S. emis Green eggs, they are already out of money. Next year the state will again be short by 21 billion. There is no more help coming, the state will go broke as it should. The average state worker now makes twice as much money as the private sector and the liberals have turned it into a real mess.

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