May 08, 2008
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/a_power_of_nonsense/
The Brumby Government's latest green plan, to buy extra power generated
by solar-powered homes, is as useless as it is pricey - but it could
have been even worse:
The Age has learned that Environment Minister Gavin Jennings' plan for a
generous scheme to encourage more Victorians to power their homes with
"green" energy was rejected after the forceful intervention of Energy
Minister Peter Batchelor. ...
Government officials calculate that under the scheme adopted by cabinet,
the bills of non-solar households will rise by about $10 a year on
average. They say that under Environment Victoria's more generous scheme
(pushed by Jennings), the increase would have been about $100.
Mr Batchelor last night said under the new scheme, households would be
paid nearly four times the retail rate for their excess energy. Mr
Batchelor argued it could cut the time for an average household to pay
off the cost of installing solar panels - about $21,000, minus a federal
rebate of $8000 - through cuts in their energy bill to less than 10
years.
Think it through.
Taxpayers are subsidising a source of intermittent power that produces
electricity at four times the usual cost, using solar panels so
expensive that even with huge government rebates they will cost
householders at least a decade to pay off. And this is done to make an
unmeasurably tiny cut in the gases claimed to cause a global warming
that might not actually be bad, but in any case stopped a decade ago.
Yes, it really is that insane.
--
Warmest Regards
Bonzo
"Consensus is neither a scientific fact nor important in science, but it
is very important in politics." Dr. Timothy Ball, Chairman of the
Natural Resources Stewardship Project (NRSP.com), Former Professor Of
Climatology, University of Winnipeg
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