What $10,990 bought in 1955....

[krispos42]

93. Well, there are a bunch of ways it could be done

Federal, state, and local levels would need to get involved, of course.

But since the direct issue isn't really the energy a house consumes, but rather what is consumed to produce the energy, the first thing we can do is create a carbon-credit exchange, where carbon pollution credits are bought and sold like shares of stock. Every year, reduce the number of carbon credits issued. This would encourage non-carbon-producing technologies.

We can shift tax credits and subsidies away from oil wells and towards wind farms and solar farms. The mandated increases in automotive fuel economy are going to help as well.

On a state level, utilities can be required to "run the meters backwards", so that a person only pays for the net monthly energy consumed if they have generating capacity on their land, such as solar cells or wind turbines. They produce small, a domestic rooftop-sized wind turbines that can produce a few hundred to a couple of thousand watts in a good wind. So subsidizing the installation of solar cells and/or wind turbines on houses would be a good start.

On a local level, cities and counties can adjust their property tax codes. We have a progressive income tax; would a progressive property tax be such a bad thing? Something based on domestic square footage?

Two-and-four family houses are also a bit more efficient than stand-along houses; having a slightly lower tax rate for those kinds of houses might be helpful.


Ultimately, we have to go over to nuclear fusion power, but that's still a bit away. But if we can achieve that... we can stop worrying quite so much about pollution.