[FRIAM] bigger plans, bigger little mistakes - Electron Symmetry
Robert Howard
rob at symmetricobjects.com
Mon Apr 30 18:36:55 EDT 2007
REFERRING TO:
* Nah, first put the screws to ourselves, and if necessary the rest of
the hemisphere.
Here’s the argument as I understand it:
“We have invented a game called Carbon Offsets. But to be effective, it
really requires everyone’s cooperation. Unfortunately, we can’t get them to
play. They just don’t get it! Here, I’m referring to us being the USA and
they being China, and the game is something like the Kyoto Protocol, which
China and India are exempt from many of the rules. Fortunately, we can get
them to play by setting a good example. The USA should TIT first in hopes
that they TAT back. Since we believe so strongly in our convictions that our
proposed rules of play should be followed by all players cooperatively, we
can entice China to play by merely playing solitaire first. They will
ultimately like the outcome of our game so much that they will beg us to let
them play too.”
Well, if that’s true, then it should also be true for a finer resolution,
such as those US citizens that believe in the game versus those that haven’t
quite made the leap of faith. So I propose that we politically
self-partition of our population. Those US citizens that wish play register
online with the government. Next, we create a big government regulatory
department of lawyers that enforce just those that have registered to be
measured for their carbon output and to buy carbon offset certificates. In
time, the other citizens will eventually register too. And this will cascade
up to include the entire Earth’s population. Those that saw the light early
have proof that they were smarter, and are entitled to the bragging rights
that they helped make the world a better place or everyone.
But if the argument turns out to be wrong, and the game is just another
utopian ideal (i.e. a system in which a few defectors can spoil the whole
lot and which must spend enormous amounts of energy suppressing them) then
at least the adverse effects generated by those that improperly “put the
screws on themselves” are confined to just them—truly a sincere hedging of
risk.
Also Phil, could you clarify what you meant by “The global solution is to
have the full cost of demand reflected in supply”. Assuming I understand it
right, doesn’t the distributed price system do that already?
Robert Howard
Phoenix, Arizona
_____
From: friam-bounces at redfish.com [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf
Of Phil Henshaw
Sent: Monday, April 30, 2007 4:34 AM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] bigger plans, bigger little mistakes - Electron
Symmetry
There's some humor in this of course... black market money does at least
travel in real suite cases, and black market electrons do look quite alike
on the common carrier, but electrons all have lawyers to solve that sort of
thing don't they???
______
The dilemma that conservation (by one group) actually stimulates waste (by
another group) is the way I like to frame the core problem, I have just
never understood why people advocate personal restraint in resource use,
like water, as a response to overwhelming societal waste of the same
resource. Sure, it's hard to pull together any whole system problem
statement or model for response, but just ignoring the difference seems to
be most everyone's favorite solution.
______
The global solution is to have the full cost of demand reflected in
supply... and not surprisingly, that requires some systems thinking we
haven't done yet.
Phil Henshaw ¸¸¸¸.·´ ¯ `·.¸¸¸¸
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
680 Ft. Washington Ave
NY NY 10040
tel: 212-795-4844
e-mail: pfh at synapse9.com
explorations: www.synapse9.com <http://www.synapse9.com/>
-----Original Message-----
From: friam-bounces at redfish.com [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf
Of Robert Howard
Sent: Sunday, April 29, 2007 4:56 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] bigger plans, bigger little mistakes - Electron
Symmetry
Here are some problems with carbon offsets I never hear in debates:
o Electrons cross both state and country borders. There’s a whole
“futures” industry on buying electricity for speculative market demand. For
example, California in
<http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=3062&sequence=0> 2000.
o All electrons look the same. It’s impossible to look at an electron
on the grid and say, hey, that electron came from a coal fired plant in
Russia and that one came from solar cells in Tucson. We have the same
problem with shady black markets that move tons of cash. At least cash comes
in suitcases owned by people and moves far slower than the speed of light.
And, since the grid uses alternating current, electrons really only move
about most 3000 miles before they make a 180 turn round trip back to where
they started from. It’s the electromagnetic field that crosses borders.
If we raise the price of “our” electricity through carbon offsets, then up
goes the demand of some other defecting country’s coal-produced force field.
They’d make much more off the market differential than any CO2 subsidy
they’d get after the administration took its share. This recursively works
for all products that depend on electricity, such as aluminum cans,
airplanes, and vacations. Right now, the US can produce petroleum-driven
electricity far cleaner, cheaper and efficiently than any third-world
country. If the goal is “clean”, wouldn’t we rather get our electricity from
us than them?
Robert Howard
Phoenix, Arizona
-----Original Message-----
From: friam-bounces at redfish.com [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf
Of Phil Henshaw
Sent: Sunday, April 29, 2007 5:54 AM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] bigger plans, bigger little mistakes
Or somewhat equivalently, getting us to pay carbon taxes on what we
consume... To do that we'd need some way guess the carbon content (and
other earth insults) for products the manufacturer didn't provide
verifiable data for... and just as necessary, some believable plan for
using the money collected. *But* that too would still provide only
temporary relief!! The co2/$ ratio for total economic product (economic
efficiency) can only be reduced toward a positive limit and not toward
zero (real 2nd law).
Phil Henshaw ¸¸¸¸.·´ ¯ `·.¸¸¸¸
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
680 Ft. Washington Ave
NY NY 10040
tel: 212-795-4844
e-mail: pfh at synapse9.com
explorations: www.synapse9.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: friam-bounces at redfish.com
> [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf Of Robert Howard
> Sent: Saturday, April 28, 2007 11:23 PM
> To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] bigger plans, bigger little mistakes
>
>
> Now, if we can just get those Chinese to pay carbon taxes, we
> might be able to compete. :-)
>
> Robert Howard
> Phoenix, Arizona
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: friam-bounces at redfish.com
> [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf Of Marcus G. Daniels
> Sent: Saturday, April 28, 2007 2:03 PM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] bigger plans, bigger little mistakes
>
> phil henshaw wrote:
> > The consensus response to global warming relies on reducing the
> > impacts of economic growth by improving the efficiency of economic
> > growth!
> So we need a lot more clean power, and we need it fast.
> Time to spend
> some money on figuring out how to do it!
> Without efficiency gains, it's estimated 10 TW are needed globally by
> 2025. [1]
> The ITER/DEMO fusion reactor only promises net 1.5 GW by 2045
> [2], and
> the largest hydroelectric facilities (Three Gorges Dam in
> China) are at
> about 22 GW [3]. There's not enough high-grade silicon for
> dozens of
> square miles of conventional photovoltaic solar [4]. Meanwhile, China
> builds a new coal fired planed every week [5] and apparently can keep
> doing that for 100 years [6].
>
> Seems to me any cost imbalance of solar, etc. is easily fixable by
> taxing the hell out of CO2 energy emissions while subsidizing the
> development of new solar, fusion, carbon sequestration
> technology (etc).
>
> [1] http://t8web.lanl.gov/people/rajan/Gupta_energy_for_all_2007.pdf
> [2] http://fire.pppl.gov/isfnt7_maisonnier.pdf
> [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Gorges_Dam
> [4] http://www.ft.com/cms/s/e50784ea-78cb-11db-8743-0000779e2340.html
> [5] http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1223/p01s04-sten.html
> [6]
> http://www.technologyreview.com/printer_friend>
ly_article.aspx?id=17963
>
>
>
>
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