When people fret about the economic cost of transitioning to a low-carbon economy in the US, I think of two things:
1. The enormous amount of low-hanging fruit for energy savings in the US - huge poorly insulated houses, fuel guzzling cars and development patterns, ancient fossil fuel plants subsidized past their useful lives
2. Tens of trillions spent on Iraq and Afghanistan.
If we were somehow ok with that money going up into smoke (or the pockets of the defense industry), then surely we should be able to spend the same amount transforming the economy into a sustainable one and rebuilding our infrastructure, with the bonus of a huge domestic stimulus and job creation and technology program.
We have the technology today, we know the solutions, the problem is political.
Yeah, that is what I was trying say. The money is available but we choose to spend it on other things that seem less important but have powerful vested interests behind it.
If we spend it on fighting climate change instead someone else will get that money, and the people currently getting it is not going to let them happen without a fight.
1. The enormous amount of low-hanging fruit for energy savings in the US - huge poorly insulated houses, fuel guzzling cars and development patterns, ancient fossil fuel plants subsidized past their useful lives
2. Tens of trillions spent on Iraq and Afghanistan.
If we were somehow ok with that money going up into smoke (or the pockets of the defense industry), then surely we should be able to spend the same amount transforming the economy into a sustainable one and rebuilding our infrastructure, with the bonus of a huge domestic stimulus and job creation and technology program.
We have the technology today, we know the solutions, the problem is political.