Talk:European energy policy

I hear it constantly from greens, that whining anti-human rant that "cheap" energy is bad, that civilization needs to scale back, that we need to dismantle cities, that we need to be poor. There's no evidence for any of it and that makes "greens" about as annoying as Creationists.

It's petrol, and gas, and possibly coal, that are disappearing, not "energy". It's petrol, gas and coal that are possibly inducing global warming. Where the hell do these anti-human bastards get off saying that we have to reduce our standard of living so we can return to an hallucinated version of the Noble Savage lifestyle?

Let's be explicit here and stop talking in euphemisms of "high investment" energy sources. We're talking about nuclear, yes? I know I am. I know that the first thing that comes to mind when the term "energy policy" comes up is nuclear. And you know what? Nuclear is cheap! So long as you're smart and competent about it.

Our goals in an energy policy should be clear:


 * build nuclear plants
 * shut down Germany's coal plants
 * nuke Britain, or Downing Street at least
 * switch to mass transit
 * develop city freight systems
 * develop electric vehicles

Mass transit (TGV, AGV, HST in general) is well on its way to replacing jet airplanes for domestic flights. It is also slowly replacing the private car. This is so in pretty much all of Europe which means not in Britain. Germany's ICE trains should be redesigned to make use of Jacobs bogies though. Maglev is a waste of time.

The big problem with mass transit is the urban freight problem. If and when this is cracked, urban transit becomes a solved problem. Maybe aerobus can help, maybe not.

Another goal of a European energy policy must be to barter energy resources, trading oil for nuclear plants. A megawatt is a megawatt no matter what its origin, and France could trade its nuclear know-how for petrol on a barter basis. There remains the question of whether this would be economically viable but certainly it would make sense on the basis of development aid. Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Venezuela, Brazil and all other oil-consuming nations could be targets of such a policy.

And then of course, if we're talking about reorienting economic incentives towards greater investment in the future, then why not talk about negative-interest currency? The chief "problem" with a negative-interest currency is that it is currently illegal in some European countries. Oh and that it would annihilate the European Central Bank in favour of decentralized economic planning. If France can't control its own central bank, there is no reason why it should object. -- Richard


 * Who's Richard? Migeru 17:57, 18 May 2008 (UTC)