Science Talk

Dennis · Guest

COMMENTARY FROM WSJ

HEAD: Your Carbon Ration Card

While American politicians mull a carbon cap-and-trade system for industry,
our British cousins are already contemplating the next step: personal CO2
rations.

A Parliamentary committee in May proposed giving all British adults "carbon
allowances" that they would be required to spend - along with, you know,
real money - when buying gasoline, airline tickets, electricity or natural
gas. Britons who wanted more credits than they were issued could try to buy
them - again, with real money - from those who hadn't spent their allotment.
All of this is supposed to give people a financial incentive to reduce
energy consumption and thus their carbon "footprint."

The Labour government, already in a precarious political state, isn't dumb
enough to support the rationing plan, which Environment Minister Hilary Benn
calls "ahead of its time." Instead, it favors a climate-change bill that
Parliament is on the verge of passing that would lay much of the necessary
groundwork. But eco-eager Britons don't have to wait for Westminster. A
private test program for personal cap-and-trade began recently with 1,000
volunteers keeping tabs of their gasoline use.

It would cost a country like Britain billions of dollars a year to run a
personal cap-and-trade system nationwide, but set that aside. War-time-like
energy rations are a clear illustration of the extent to which
environmentalists hope to control every aspect of modern life. Do you really
want to blow much of your annual "ration" on that long carbon-spewing jet
flight to Florida, or should you swap that summer AC for weekend drives in
the country?

The global warmists want you to sacrifice for their cause. And the duration
of their war on carbon will make the decade-and-a-half of British rationing
during and after World War II seem like a fleeting moment. The pending
climate-change bill calls for a 60% cut in carbon emissions from their 1990
levels by 2050. Once 2050 rolls around, who exactly will declare the end of
hostilities?

The prospect of personal CO2 rations should debunk the idea that the cost of
curbing carbon emissions would fall on the owners of dirty old factories.
That notion was always a green herring: Like corporate taxes, the business
costs of carbon reduction will be passed on to consumers. In that sense, we
should be grateful to the Brits for showing us where this anticarbon crusade
really ends up.
***********
More of Al "I am too the alpha male, aren't I, Tipper, huh, aren't I" Gore's
bozos on parade. Let's hope the orange fright wig-wearing red noses on this
side of the Atlantic aren't so silly, or it's seltzer down the pants for us
all.

Dionysus

robert bowman · Guest

On Tue, 08 Jul 2008 08:20:47 -0400, Dennis wrote:

Dennis · Guest

"robert bowman" <bowman@montana.com> wrote in message
news:6dh9b7F2i3mfU1@mid.individual.net...