Reply To: Cap and Trade

[Aeronaut]

Phil’s Dad wrote: Rezwan, you speculate the scenario where “The issue is no longer carbon, or greenhouse gases. But C&T;remains!”

I can’t for the life of me see why it would. 8-/

I think I am with Brian when he says;”Water rights will also become moot. Desalinization and other water purification and pumping options will open up with FF.”

In other words if there is plentiful / cheap energy then there is more than enough water to be had. No need for a cap. 🙂 The issue is only getting it to where it is needed but we already pay for that (where I come from anyway) so that doesn’t change anything fundamental. (Might be a few disused oil or gas pipelines that could be used for the purpose – just a thought because I have no idea if they are in the right place.)

To stray into the off topic area. %-P The “not the first shots” showed that “the machine needs to be tweaked and it wasn’t quite there.” I know the guys are busy but could we have a clue as what that means in practical terms?

C&T;will remain due to the money, influence, and inertia that got it this far, coupled with the fact that FF won’t be universally available until many years after FF goes into mass production, the prices have come down, the later adopters come aboard, etc.

Then there’s the bond issues to build water pipelines, and that puts a lot of North America at least 10 years from that water. I’d guess more like 20 years. The idea of re-purposing oil & gas pipelines is guaranteed to make a HUGE stink over here, even if the demand for oil and gas suddenly ceased.

On the brighter side, Obama’s blank check remains mostly unspent, so pipelines would make a great follow-up to Roosevelt’s TVA dam builders.