“If others don’t go green, California could become an outlier, saddling businesses with costly new power while neighboring states continue to use traditional, cheaper energy, experts say. If the efforts under way in California spread to become the new normal, however, all will benefit from economies of scale. “If more states order power companies to limit their use of fossil fuels, for example, the incentive will grow nationwide for firms to develop cheaper alternatives, leaving California consumers less exposed to spikes in electricity rates.”
Cal Watch then goes on, quoting someone who can count:
The ‘underlying flaw’ that’s obvious to outside observers “The price of carbon in California hit its lowest point this year at the most recent quarterly auction of emissions allowances. The price per metric ton of carbon was lower than expected, down 13 percent from the last auction in May. As Bloomberg reports, the low price was likely due to California’s stated plan to give away permits for free to avoid harming struggling industries . …This shit is the reason California is a poor uneducated economy, the local rags simply too stupid to transmit any valid, worthwhile information.
“So what does this mean? One green blogger sees the auction in a positive light, pointing to the fact that all available credits were sold as a sign of the market’s health. But the drop in the price of carbon must be worrying to state regulators. They have to be aware of the fact that in Europe, the price of carbon plummeted due to over-allocation of permits. Europe’s carbon market is currently broken because planners are wary of the effect a high price might have on energy-intensive industry. And that’s the fundamental problem with carbon markets: if the price is too low, companies lose the incentive to curb emissions, but if it’s too high, many companies will simply up and move to a location where they don’t have to pay for carbon.“California is trying to walk that line, and so far it’s in better shape than Europe. But there’s little reason to expect California’s greens will find the solution to that underlying flaw.”-
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