> As that article says, there aren't many factories for what this is cost effective.
... a problem that's even worse for e-fuels, because you have the same fundamental inefficiency plus round-trip losses.
That's my point.
>What really means that it's a job for the government.
Subsidizing unnecessarily wasteful tech with taxpayer dollars isn't the answer, but of course you'll never hear that from the ones looking for a free handout...
The real answer? "It's the Market, stupid." A carbon tax (or even better, cap-and-dividend) is consistently rated as the most efficient solution by economists. One-sided subsidies (or even worse, privatization as you propose) unavoidably causes false corrupted price signals, which leads to both economic and energy inefficiency.
The government's proper role is to be the referee, not to pick winners and losers. The Invisible Hand Of The Market should decide which technology "wins," not some bureaucrat in Washington.
There's a difference between treating the market as an end and using one as a means. You (and yukkuri below) are criticizing the former, but I'm advocating the latter.
When society sets the values ("reduce this harmful pollution below X please"), a market can be a very efficient means of accomplishing that. NOx trading is one example. The problems come when the market itself starts getting held up as the primary underlying value in-and-of-itself.
Markets should be considered as powerful tools, not the main goal. Just my opinion. Anyway cheers.
No amount of taxing and mingling will make protection against long-tail events profitable. It's something that either the government does or it hires, the market will not provide. (But, well, it can order too, that works.)
For seasonal balancing, nothing is certain. Maybe you luck-out and there's a profitable way to consume the summer overproduction. But I'd advise against betting your life on it. Anyway, carbon taxing does absolutely nothing to change the profitability of this one.
The funny thing is that the US (I imagine this is your context, because most people thinking this way are there) is one of the democracies that most intervene on energy safety. It doesn't show on the final result, but the amount of reserves that government holds is so large that when it changes its mind on something it bankrupts people.
>No amount of taxing and mingling will make protection against long-tail events profitable. It's something that either the government does or it hires, the market will not provide.
[citation desperately needed]
Insurance seems to be quite an effective mechanism for handling rare events.
>Anyway, carbon taxing does absolutely nothing to change the profitability of this one.
Of course it does. When "Good Old Reliable" carbon-heavy baseload gets more expensive, that creates more incentive for storage (factobattery or otherwise).
Remember that the end goal is to achieve 100% renewable energy, not to build the most factobatteries. If you build more factobatteries than needed to efficiently achieve 100% renewable energy, you did it wrong.
The free market is horribly defective and how we got into all these messes. But have fun trying to be one of the exploiters until everything collapses because we refuse to regulate because it might earn one you less yacht
That's my point.
Subsidizing unnecessarily wasteful tech with taxpayer dollars isn't the answer, but of course you'll never hear that from the ones looking for a free handout...The real answer? "It's the Market, stupid." A carbon tax (or even better, cap-and-dividend) is consistently rated as the most efficient solution by economists. One-sided subsidies (or even worse, privatization as you propose) unavoidably causes false corrupted price signals, which leads to both economic and energy inefficiency.
The government's proper role is to be the referee, not to pick winners and losers. The Invisible Hand Of The Market should decide which technology "wins," not some bureaucrat in Washington.