Darwin Award: Amory Lovins says "less government meddling will unlock green energy's power..."

[txlibdem]

Under the heading of 'I have no functioning brain cells' the LA Times writes:

Less government meddling could unlock green energy's power

By Michael Hiltzik
October 30, 2011

"It's refreshing to think that we needn't wait for Washington," Amory Lovins told me recently. The founder and chairman of the Old Snowmass, Colo.-based Rocky Mountain Institute, Lovins has been a leader in the science of energy efficiency for decades.

...

Lovins' book is different in that it's also prescriptive, outlining what consumers and industries need to do to make energy independence a reality. Much of his vision involves standing aside and allowing market forces and innovation to work their magic.

more at: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hiltzik-20111030,0,245833.column

It's funny. One would think we'd have had a 100% green energy grid by now without all that pesky "Gubmint" meddling. The magic market forces surely should have given us a 100% green energy by now. After all, it's been 30 years since Ronnie Raygun took office. I just don't understand why those magic market forces haven't done that yet...

[phantom power]

1. right, because deregulation has worked out so well for every other form of energy

:eyes:

[kristopher]

7. Did you read his ideas or just react as a typical pronuclear hater of Amory Lovins?

http://www.rmi.org/Knowledge-Center/ReinventingFire

Transportation
Background on transportation sector and current fossil fuel consumption

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - automotive design

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - enhanced use for personal mobility

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - heavy trucks and domestic freight

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - airplanes

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - substituting alternative fuels for remaining oil needs

Society-wide financial and energy use implications of Reinventing Fire for transportation sector


SEE ALL TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH »
Buildings
Background on buildings sector and current fossil fuel consumption

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - business-as-usual trajectory

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - energy efficient technologies

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - smart controls

Fossil fuel reduction opportunities - integrative design

Society-wide financial and energy use implications of Reinventing Fire for buildings sector


SEE ALL BUILDINGS RESEARCH »
Electricity
Background on electricity sector

Four potential electricity futures

Reinventing Fire cost inputs

Reinventing Fire technology inputs

Reinventing Fire system operations


SEE ALL ELECTRICITY RESEARCH »
Industry
Background on transportation sector and current energy consumption

Energy reduction opportunities - energy efficiency

Energy reduction opportunities - CHP

Industry transformations

Integrative design

Fuel switching

Society-wide financial and energy use implications of Reinventing Fire for industry sector

[txlibdem]

8. Did you read where he called for all Fossil subsidies to be ended? Me neither!

Because he didn't.

So his brilliant plan (gonna sell a lot of books) is to let the market have its way with renewable energy sources???

[Name removed]

10. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[bananas]

35. He said it right here - on NPR's Science Friday - you can hear it with your own ears

You can read the transcript here:

http://www.power-eng.com/news/2011/10/1525687521/reinventing-fire-getting-beyond-fossil-fuels.html

<snip>

FLATOW: You're welcome. What is the government's role here, Amory?

LOVINS: Well, there are some temporary subsidies which are generally political pawns to renewables. What's seldom mentioned is that there are generally bigger permanent subsidies to fossil fuel and nuclear energy. And I would like, actually, to get rid of all of them, those subsidies, and let always to save or produce energy compete fairly at honest prices, regardless of their type, technology, size, location or ownership. That's pretty much the opposite of the energy policy we have.

There's a very important government role in allowing free competition and interconnection to the grid, so there's more of a level playing field, and that is done mostly by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. But utilities tend to be regulated at a state level, and there it's really important, in the 34 states that haven't done this reform yet, to reward our utilities for cutting our bills, not for selling us more energy, which rewards the opposite of what we want. The - but it turns out...

FLATOW: OK. So let me just say this...

LOVINS: Yeah.

FLATOW: You think if we let them all float freely, all the different energies - coal, oil, nuclear, solar, wind, whatever - that the alternative energies could compete effectively with the other ones.

<snip>

You can hear him say it with your own ears right here:

http://www.sciencefriday.com/program/archives/201110215

Friday, October 21st, 2011
Reinventing Fire: Getting Beyond Fossil Fuels

In his book Reinventing Fire, Amory Lovins lays out his blueprint for freeing society of its addiction to fossil fuels, by saving energy with more efficient vehicles, buildings and manufacturing plants, and producing it with renewable options like windmills and rooftop solar.

[txlibdem]

40. Thank you, Bananas. That was a much appreciated additon to the discussion

I withdraw my earlier snipe.

:grouphug:

[kristopher]

41. It was already completely clear from the article the OP references.

[txlibdem]

43. There were over 20 links at that page and nothing said what you claimed

I don't have time to go through 20 links to track down the proof of your comment: I believe that should be your responsibility.

But that's ok. We still don't agree on Amory Lovins due to his source of funds. My dad used to say, "lie down with dogs and you'll wake up with fleas."

[kristopher]

45. Are you unable to read?!? The subject of his book is getting rid of all fossil fuels

The sources of funding have nothing to do with your sloppy attempts to bad-mouth him. You, like all other extreme pronuclear folk hate him and try to discredit him because of what his work has shown the public about the lies of the nuclear industry.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=315431&mesg_id=315684

[txlibdem]

57. You forget, Kris, that I too criticize the current nuclear industry also

I hate LWR and PWR reactors. I hate the fact that we use Uranium to fuel them. I hate that the nuclear plant construction contractors get to basically write a blank check to build one of those things; cost overruns are guaranteed because they get paid no matter what -- so "what" seems to happen a lot. That has to change and it will change.

The change will be smaller reactors that are built in a factory to quality specs and then buried at a pre-prepared site and hooked up either to hot water lines to generate electricity or cooler hot water lines meant to provide district heating.

You keep trying to lump everyone into one bad bunch of apples. It doesn't work for me.

[bananas]

47. That transcript link doesn't seem to work anymore - here's one at NPR

http://www.npr.org/2011/10/21/141591191/reinventing-fire-getting-beyond-fossil-fuels

[Marazinia]

2. Well in that case

No more soldiers. No more cops. No more roads. No more airports. No more schools, nor anything else funded by tax dollars or run by government. Let's go all the way with this if we're going, and see where it gets us, shall we?

But none of these guys ever embrace that idea for some reason.

[kristopher]

6. You obviously know nothing of Lovins.

He is one of the good guys who has worked for decades to put control of energy into the hands of the public - the nuclear industry hates him with a passion for that reason. He isn't a "free marketeer"; he is a brilliant energy policy analyst that knows what we need to do to make the change to a carbon free energy system. Try reading his book or some of his papers at his website:
http://www.rmi.org/Knowledge-Center/ReinventingFire

Lovins isn't alone.
See also. Will Big Business Save the Earth?
By JARED DIAMOND
Published: December 5, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/06/opinion/06diamond.html?pagewanted=all

Du discussion:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x7171028#7183092

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jared_Diamond

[Marazinia]

11. If the nuclear industry truly hates him, I'll have to check out his work

Because he must be doing something right. But I don't like sweeping deregulation and faith in business over government rhetoric, because so many of the things we rely on are either heavily regulated or completely government run. And despite the fact that our government is at the feet of the corporations due to private money in politics, they do manage to get some things right. (Not nearly enough, I'll grant you.)

[kristopher]

14. They despise him.

His ideas are not that government shouldn't enforce the value based norms of the public. He focuses on ways to find a path of profitability through sustainability and improved efficiency.

Take a look at this and then think of the waste in terms of potential savings/profit for businesses and thus as a tool to move the economy in the desired direction.
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/20-quadrillion-btus-of-wasted-energy/

[Marazinia]

16. Interesting article

A scary and unnecessary waste. However, I'm just going to quote this bit of it, which does support my point on a need for continued regulation and updating of regulation:

The reasons for this growing gap are many, but the bulk of the problem is tied to outdated regulatory models for utilities. Many a utility shareholder might ask, who cares about efficiency if no one gets paid for it? Decoupling and other incentives, such as EPA regulations that will shut down the dirtiest (and many of the oldest) coal-fired power plants are two steps that will help to address the issue.


I'm going to check out your other links tomorrow. If I'm going to be properly outraged on a subject, the more educated I am on it, the better!

[kristopher]

18. Here is the Executive Summary of the Book diccussed in the OP

http://www.rmi.org/rfexecutivesummary

Remember this is the guy that another poster just accused of working on behalf of the fossil fuel industry...

Reinventing Fire Executive Summary


Digging up and burning the deposits of ancient sunlight stored eons ago in primeval swamps has transformed human existence and made industrial and urban civilization possible. However, those roughly four cubic miles of fossil fuels every year are no longer the only, best, or even cheapest way to sustain and expand the global economy—whether or not we count fossil fuels’ hidden costs.

Those “external” costs, paid not at the fuel pump or electric meter but in our taxes, wealth, and health, are not counted in the Reinventing Fire analysis, but are disturbingly large. Tens of billions of taxpayer dollars each year subsidize America’s fossil fuels, and even more flow to the systems that burn those fuels, distorting market choices by making the fuels look far cheaper than they really are. But the biggest hidden costs are economic and military.


America’s seemingly two-billion-dollar-a-day oil habit actually costs upwards of three times that much—six billion dollars a day, or a sixth of GDP. That’s due to three kinds of hidden costs, each about a half-trillion dollars per year: the macro economic costs of oil dependence, the microeconomic costs of oil-price volatility, and the military costs of forces whose primary mission is intervention in the Persian Gulf. Those military costs are about ten times what we pay to buy oil from the Persian Gulf, and rival total defense spending at the height of the Cold War.

Any costs to health, safety, environment, security of energy supply, world stability and peace, or national independence or reputation are extra. Coal, too, has hidden costs, chiefly to health, of about $180–530 billion per year, and natural gas had lesser but nontrivial externalities even before shale-gas “fracking” emerged.

All fossil fuels, to varying degrees, also incur climate risks...

[Marazinia]

21. Okay, I'm starting to understand more of what he's driving at

He's focused on the efficiency side of things (which imo is a good focus regardless of the energy source). At this point I'm still in favor of full nationalization of the energy sector, though.

[TheWraith]

31. Don't bother--he's a greenwasher. Nothing more, nothing less.

His "institute" is funded by BP, Shell, Walmart, and tons and tons of money from the people who have a vested interest in the status quo, for the purpose of convincing people that everything will be fine, and letting the "free market" work will solve all our energy problems with more efficient light bulbs.

[Name removed]

Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[TheWraith]

33. Don't get angry at me just because he publicly declared his allegiance to big business.

I know losing a hero hurts, but the real lesson is that he was never on your side. It was a scam, no different from Nader's campaign to elect Bush.

[bananas]

52. Nope - you are 100% wrong.

In the meantime you have fallen for nuclear industry greenwashing.

[Name removed]

32. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[wtmusic]

34. While attempting to discredit nuclear he's made a small fortune from Big Oil.

"Mr. Lovins’s other clients have included Accenture, Allstate, AMD, Anglo American, Anheuser-Busch, Bank of America, Baxter, Borg-Warner, BP, HP Bulmer, Carrier, Chevron, Ciba-Geigy, CLSA, ConocoPhillips, Corning, Dow, Equitable, GM, HP, Invensys, Lockheed Martin, Mitsubishi, Monsanto, Motorola, Norsk Hydro, Petrobras, Prudential, Rio Tinto, Royal Dutch/Shell, Shearson Lehman Amex, STMicroelectronics, Sun Oil, Suncor, Texas Instruments, UBS, Unilever, Westinghouse, Xerox, major developers, and over 100 energy utilities."

http://www.rmi.org/rmi/Amory+B.+Lovins

[txlibdem]

42. There sholdn't be any link between who pays your lucrative lifestyle and your views and opinions

But, that evidence is pretty damning.

[kristopher]

44. That "evidence" is only "damning" when you nuclear folks take it out of context

...Mr. Lovins led the energy design for his home (and RMI’s original headquarters), whose ~99% savings in space- and water-heating energy (to –44°C or –47°F) and ~90% in home electricity paid back in ten months with 1983 technology. An $18-million utility experiment he cofounded and -steered in the 1990s, PG&E’s “ACT²,” validated his claim that very large energy savings could cost less than small or no savings, e.g. in houses comfortable with no air conditioner at up to +46ºC (+115°F) yet costing less to build. He founded and until 2007 chaired RMI’s fourth spinoff, the advanced-composites technology developer Fiberforge Corporation, and is RMI’s lead practitioner—lately helping redesign >$30 billion worth of facilities in 29 sectors—in implementing for major firms the tenets of natural capitalism, which shared the 2001 Shingo Prize (Research), the “Nobel Prize for Manufacturing.” In 2004, he led a Pentagon-cosponsored synthesis of how to eliminate U.S. oil use, led by business for profit, and in 2007, became the first member of the Transformation Advisory Council for the Executive Chairman of Ford Motor Company. His other senior advisory relationships have lately served the leaders of Coca-Cola, Deutsche Bank, Holcim, Interface, and Wal-Mart and of several startup firms.

Mr. Lovins’s other clients have included Accenture, Allstate, AMD, Anglo American, Anheuser-Busch, Bank of America, Baxter, Borg-Warner, BP, HP Bulmer, Carrier, Chevron, Ciba-Geigy, CLSA, ConocoPhillips, Corning, Dow, Equitable, GM, HP, Invensys, Lockheed Martin, Mitsubishi, Monsanto, Motorola, Norsk Hydro, Petrobras, Prudential, Rio Tinto, Royal Dutch/Shell, Shearson Lehman Amex, STMicroelectronics, Sun Oil, Suncor, Texas Instruments, UBS, Unilever, Westinghouse, Xerox, major developers, and over 100 energy utilities. His public-sector clients have included the OECD, the UN, and RFF; the Australian, Canadian, Dutch, German, and Italian governments; 13 states; Congress; and the U.S. Energy and Defense Departments.

Mr. Lovins has briefed 21 heads of state, given expert testimony in eight countries and 20+ states, delivered thousands of lectures, and written 31 books and more than 450 papers, as well as poetry, landscape photography, music (he was a pianist and composer), and an electronics patent. In 1980–81 he served on the U.S. Department of Energy’s senior advisory board, and in 1999–2001 and 2006–08, on Defense Science Board task forces on military energy strategy. In 1984 he was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science “for his book Soft Energy Paths and many other noteworthy contributions to energy policy,” in 1988, of the World Academy of Arts and Sciences, and in 2001, of the World Business Academy. Dr. Alvin Weinberg, former Director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, called him “surely the most articulate writer on energy in the whole world today; "Newsweek, "one of the Western world’s most influential energy thinkers.” Dr. John Ahearne, then Vice President of Resources for the Future, remarked that “Amory Lovins has done more to assemble and advance understanding of efficiency opportunities than any other single person.” The Centennial Issue of The Wall Street Journal named him among 39 people in the world most likely to change the course of business in the 1990s; Car called him the 22nd most powerful person in the global car industry; and The Economist wrote in 2008 that “history has proved him right.”

An occasional advisor to the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners, World Business Council for Sustainable Development, and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Mr. Lovins has addressed hundreds of fora sponsored by such groups as The Engineering Foundation, Association of Energy Engineers, ASHRAE, Society of Automotive Engineers, Royal Academy of Engineering, National Academy of Sciences, American Physical Society, International Association for Energy Economics, Montreux Energy Forum, Institution of Electrical Engineers, McKinsey, Accenture, Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan, Allen & Co., News Corporation, Fortune, Forbes, Time, ULI, IDRC, CoreNet, AIA, API, AAPG, AGA, EEI, EPRI, CRIEPI, Hoover and Brookings Institutions, CSIS, Chatham House, Council on Foreign Relations, Pacific Council, Commonwealth Club, Keidanren, Conference Board, World Economic Forum, Tällberg Conference, TED, FiRE, eg, World Bank, GBN, Highlands Forum, NPS, NWC, NDU, DAU, Aspen Design Conference, Royal Society, and Royal Society of Arts. He collaborates on landscape photography and orangutan conservation with his wife, fine-art landscape photographer Judy Hill Lovins.

He was warning of the need to take action on climate change as early as 1975.

WTF have you done for the planet today?

[txlibdem]

60. Isn't that like saying I'm a nice guy, don't take the paycheck I receive from SATAN out of context

I'm sorry. I just cannot separate the funding from the outcomes. Not when the Lovins' text is straight from the fossil fuels industry talking points.

[madokie]

25. They remind me of a certain poster I don't see much around here anymore since the nuke disaster in

Japan with his way over board hate for Lovins. LOL
Some people are just stupid or just ignorant, I'm not sure which and thats it in a nutshell. I like the way the pro nukies claim that Lovins is a lover of any and all things fossil because he helps companies to save money on their heating and cooling cost by better utilizing their options and they actually pay him real money for that so they in turn call him a shill for the fossil fuel industry when if they'd take the time to read what he says and does with an open mind they'd see that is the furtherest thing from the truth one can get. I have to laugh at these people for showing their ignorance of what he is actually doing. As this article that is linked to in this thread is proof of. LMAO at them.

[Rabblevox]

3. well f*ck. I used to admire Lovins (but then, I used to admire Nader) /nt

[txlibdem]

9. Yup. Looks like he sold out to me... I used to admire him as well.

But he takes money from big oil and other fossil fuels companies so what do you expect???

PS, I'm old enough to have once admired Nader as well. He fought the congress to get seat belt laws passed. Untold lives saved... then 2000 happened and... pffffft!

[kristopher]

13. Seriously, you are recyling Nuclear Energy Institute crap like that?

You nuclear fans sure do hate Lovins for the 1977 article (noted below) wrote that shone a light on the social consequences of nuclear power. Y'all have been accusing him of working for the fossiol fuel industry ever since.

Amory Lovins, CEO, Rocky Mountain Institute (clip duration: 2m 24s)

http://www.nci.org/conf/clip-lovins.htm

Amory B. Lovins co-founded Rocky Mountain Institute in 1982 and serves as its Chief Executive Officer (Research). An experimental physicist, educated at Harvard and Oxford, Mr. Lovins rose to prominence during the oil crises of the 1970s when, still in his 20s, he challenged conventional supply-side dogma by urging that the United States instead follow a "soft energy path." His controversial recommendations were eventually accepted by the energy industry, and his book, Soft Energy Paths: Toward a Durable Peace (1977) went on to inspire a generation of decision-makers. Lovins has received six honorary doctorates, a MacArthur Fellowship, the Heinz, Lindbergh and Right Livelihood awards, among other honors. His work today focuses on transforming the car, real-estate, electricity, water, semiconductor, and several other manufacturing sectors toward advanced resource productivity. He has briefed 12 heads of state, held several visiting academic chairs, authored or co-authored 27 books, and consulted for scores of industries and governments worldwide. The Wall Street Journal named Mr. Lovins one of 39 people world-wide "most likely to change the course of business in the '90s" .

Amory B. Lovins
Cofounder, Chairman and Chief Scientist
Snowmass

Amory B. Lovins, a 63-year-old American consultant, experimental physicist and 1993 MacArthur Fellow, has been active at the nexus of energy, resources, environment, development, and security in more than 50 countries for 35 years, including 14 years based in England. He is widely considered among the world’s leading authorities on energy—especially its efficient use and sustainable supply—and a fertile innovator in integrative design.

After two years at Harvard, Mr. Lovins transferred to Oxford, and two years later became a don at 21, receiving in consequence an Oxford MA by Special Resolution (1971) and, later, 11 honorary doctorates of various U.S. and U.K. universities. He has been Regents’ Lecturer at the U. of California both in Energy and Resources and in Economics; Grauer Lecturer at UBC; Luce Visiting Professor at Dartmouth; Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Colorado; Oikos Visiting Professor of Business, U. of St. Gallen; an engineering visiting professor at Peking U.; and 2007 MAP/Ming Professor at Stanford’s School of Engineering.

(More downloadable bios of Amory Lovins.)

During 1979–2002, Mr. Lovins worked as a team with Hunter Lovins (his wife 1979–99). They shared a 1982 Mitchell Prize, a 1983 Right Livelihood Award (often called the “alternative Nobel Prize”), the 1999 Lindbergh Award, and Time’s 2000 Heroes for the Planet Award. In 1989 he won the Onassis Foundation’s first Delphi Prize, one of the world’s top environmental awards, for their “essential contribution towards finding alternative solutions to energy problems.” That contribution included the “end-use / least-cost” redefinition of the energy problem (in Foreign Affairs in 1976)—asking what quantity, quality, scale, and source of energy will do each task in the cheapest way. This economically based approach first permitted successful foresight in the competitive energy-service marketplace.

In 1993 he received the Nissan Prize for inventing superefficient ultralight-hybrid cars, to which ~$10 billion had been committed by 2000, and in 1999, partly for that work, the World Technology Award (Environment). He also received the 1997 Heinz Award, the 2000 Happold Medal of the Construction Industry Council, the 2005 Benjamin Franklin Medal of the Royal Society of Arts (Life Fellow), and in 2007, the Blue Planet Prize, Volvo Prize, honorary membership of the American Institute of Architects, Foreign Membership of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, Time International’s Hero of the Environment award, Popular Mechanics’ Breakthrough Leadership award, and honorary Senior Fellowship of the Design Futures Council. In 2008 he was named one of America’s 24 Best Leaders by U.S. News & World Report and Harvard’s Kennedy School, and received the first Aspen Institute / National Geographic Energy and Environment Award for Individual Thought Leadership. In 2009, he received the National Design Award (Design Mind), Time named him among the world’s 100 most influential people, and Foreign Policy, one of the 100 top global thinkers. In 2010, he was Runner-Up for the Zayed Future Energy Prize.

In 1982, the ...

http://www.rmi.org/rmi/Amory+B.+Lovins

[madokie]

26. Did I not hit the nail on the head in my reply #25?

LOL

[bananas]

51. The OP has retracted his mischaracterization of Amory Lovins - see posts #35 and #40

I pointed out the OP's error in post #35: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=315431&mesg_id=315576

and the OP retracted his statements in post #40: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=315431&mesg_id=315665

Also see post #47 for an updated link to the transcript: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=315431&mesg_id=315692

[jwirr]

4. Sure about one month after we actually run out of fossil fuels.

:sarcasm:

[kristopher]

5. Why don't you try actually refuting what Lovins has to say?

Instead of the usual pronuclear approach of character attacks and unsubstantiated sniping?

In point of fact, virtually "all that pesky "Gubmint" meddling" you are so snide about is designed specifically to favor the entrenched energy interests built around centralized thermal and protect them from replacement by a system they cannot control - distributed sustainable renewable energy.

Read a book, fer goodness sake.

[txlibdem]

12. Kristopher is now on record: Green Energy should be controlled by the Invisible Hand of the Market

That's quite a statement there.

[kristopher]

15. Are you reduced to that level?

Poor feller...

[txlibdem]

17. Here are Lovins' own words:

"It's refreshing to think that we needn't wait for Washington," Amory Lovins told me recently. The founder and chairman of the Old Snowmass, Colo.-based Rocky Mountain Institute, Lovins has been a leader in the science of energy efficiency for decades.

...

Lovins' book is different in that it's also prescriptive, outlining what consumers and industries need to do to make energy independence a reality. Much of his vision involves standing aside and allowing market forces and innovation to work their magic.

Now what do you call that??? Reducing yourself to what level???

[kristopher]

19. All that shows is that you don't know the difference between ideology and economics.

A fact that has been repeatedly established here many, many times. Lovins is saying that a company is motivated by the pursuit of profit and that we should structure the regulatory regime to ensure that they find profit in the areas that are healthy to society. That places people in charge of the direction corporations move our infrastructure.

Your characterization of his ideas as "Green Energy should be controlled by the Invisible Hand of the Market" is patent nonsense. That is an ideological stance which means social norms are not in control of the goals as established by regulations for businesses; and further that business pursuit of profits is the primary goal of society from which all else flows. That is exactly the opposite of what he is writing. He is talking about building more economic winners with change than the losers from such change can possibly oppose.

Of course, you'd know that if you weren't getting your talking points from the Nuclear Energy Institute and were instead reading what he is actually writing. Remember this is the guy you just accused of working for the fossil fuel industry.

Reinventing Fire Executive Summary

...America’s seemingly two-billion-dollar-a-day oil habit actually costs upwards of three times that much—six billion dollars a day, or a sixth of GDP. That’s due to three kinds of hidden costs, each about a half-trillion dollars per year: the macro economic costs of oil dependence, the microeconomic costs of oil-price volatility, and the military costs of forces whose primary mission is intervention in the Persian Gulf. Those military costs are about ten times what we pay to buy oil from the Persian Gulf, and rival total defense spending at the height of the Cold War.

Any costs to health, safety, environment, security of energy supply, world stability and peace, or national independence or reputation are extra. Coal, too, has hidden costs, chiefly to health, of about $180–530 billion per year, and natural gas had lesser but nontrivial externalities even before shale-gas “fracking” emerged.

...Making a dollar of U.S. GDP in 2009 took 60% less oil, 50% less energy, 63% less directly burned natural gas, and 20% less electricity than it did in 1975, because more efficient use and alternative supplies have become cheaper and better than the fossil fuels they’ve displaced. Yet wringing far more work from our energy is only getting started, and is becoming an ever bigger and cheaper resource, because its technologies, designs, and delivery methods are improving faster than they’re so far being adopted.

Many other countries have lately pulled ahead of the United States in capturing the burgeoning potential for greater energy productivity and more durable and benign supplies. During 1980–2009, for example, the Danish economy grew by two-thirds, while energy use returned to its 1980 level and carbon emissions fell 21%. Now the conservative Danish government has adopted a virtually self-financing strategy to get completely off fossil fuels by 2050 by further boosting efficiency and switching to renewables (already 36% of electric generation, which is the most reliable and among the cheapest pretax in Europe). Why? To strengthen Denmark’s economy and national security. Europe as a whole is going in the same direction, led by Germany, and now Japan and China are moving that way. What could the U.S. do?
...

http://www.rmi.org/rfexecutivesummary

[cprise]

24. With all due respect to your pro-solar efforts

You obviously don't read around the rest of DU much, if at all. Your frequent underlying assumptions and implications of market superiority are recognized on this site as old hat and an intrinsic part of the global economic failure. You automatically undermine pro-solar arguments here with your pro-market cant.

Ideology and economics do overlap to a large extent.

[Name removed]

30. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[bananas]

48. On the contrary - kristopher's posts are EXACTLY in tune with Operation Wall Street

For example, one of kristopher's sources is Mark Cooper, who was quoted by the CS Monitor back in 2009:

“You want to talk about bailouts – the next generation of new nuclear power would be Fannie Mae in spades,” says Mark Cooper, senior fellow at Vermont Law School’s Institute for Energy and the Environment. Dr. Cooper is among several economic analysts who contend that – waste and safety issues aside – nuclear energy is too costly.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Innovation/2009/0813/nuclear-power-s-new-debate-cost

Face it - Bush, Cheney, and the Republicans tried to set us up for a nuclear bail-out,
just as they set us up for bailing out the financial system.

[bananas]

49. It doesn't matter if you're using dollars, barter, or Ithaca Hours: nuclear energy sucks

It doesn't matter what economic system you use, nuclear energy sucks.
For those unaware of Ithaca Hours:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ithaca_Hours

The Ithaca HOUR is a local currency used in Ithaca, New York and is the oldest and largest local currency system in the United States that is still operating.<1> It has inspired other similar systems in Madison, Wisconsin; Corvallis, Oregon;<2> and a proposed system in the Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania.<3> One Ithaca HOUR is valued at US$10 and is generally recommended to be used as payment for one hour's work, although the rate is negotiable.

<snip>

See also

• Local currency
  
• List of community currencies in the United States
  
• Labour voucher
  
• Time-based currency
  
• Wörgl

<snip>

[bananas]

22. If you were actually aware of what's happening...

... you'd know that local regulations have had much more of an effect than national policy.

"Think globally, act locally" has been extremely effective - and it will continue to be one of the most effective tools for a long time to come ...

[madokie]

27. Naw you just don't comprehend very well sometime bro'

Amazing how some can read some things and come away with asinine ideas as you just did. Man wake up the world is turning and you're standing still :hi: :-)

[bananas]

20. You completely miss the point: "nuclear, coal and natural gas — also receive government subsidies"

"Complicating the economic case for wind, Lovins explains, is that other forms of energy — nuclear, coal and natural gas — also receive government subsidies, explicitly or otherwise. In other words, in his view, the government has been placing its bets on technologies that it should be phasing out, while shortchanging one that should be encouraged."

[cprise]

23. No, the point is

that the government should be looking after the public interest, not the market's interest. Letting the market off the leash leads to the current reality that Lovins bemoans: Government as protector of concentrated wealth and power.

[madokie]

28. You don't get it either do you?

[no_hypocrisy]

29. "Pull my finger . . . . "

[Odin2005]

36. Lovins is a grifter and a quack.

[kristopher]

37. Don't make such foolish claims.

http://www.rmi.org/rfexecutivesummary

You might not like the facts but they are in the public record. All such comments do is paint you as someone incapable of facing reality because of an irrational allegiance to the nuclear industry. Here's some of what he's accomplished.

Amory B. Lovins, a 63-year-old American consultant, experimental physicist and 1993 MacArthur Fellow, has been active at the nexus of energy, resources, environment, development, and security in more than 50 countries for 35 years, including 14 years based in England. He is widely considered among the world’s leading authorities on energy—especially its efficient use and sustainable supply—and a fertile innovator in integrative design.

After two years at Harvard, Mr. Lovins transferred to Oxford, and two years later became a don at 21, receiving in consequence an Oxford MA by Special Resolution (1971) and, later, 11 honorary doctorates of various U.S. and U.K. universities. He has been Regents’ Lecturer at the U. of California both in Energy and Resources and in Economics; Grauer Lecturer at UBC; Luce Visiting Professor at Dartmouth; Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Colorado; Oikos Visiting Professor of Business, U. of St. Gallen; an engineering visiting professor at Peking U.; and 2007 MAP/Ming Professor at Stanford’s School of Engineering.

During 1979–2002, Mr. Lovins worked as a team with Hunter Lovins (his wife 1979–99). They shared a 1982 Mitchell Prize, a 1983 Right Livelihood Award (often called the “alternative Nobel Prize”), the 1999 Lindbergh Award, and Time’s 2000 Heroes for the Planet Award. In 1989 he won the Onassis Foundation’s first Delphi Prize, one of the world’s top environmental awards, for their “essential contribution towards finding alternative solutions to energy problems.” That contribution included the “end-use / least-cost” redefinition of the energy problem (in Foreign Affairs in 1976)—asking what quantity, quality, scale, and source of energy will do each task in the cheapest way. This economically based approach first permitted successful foresight in the competitive energy-service marketplace.

In 1993 he received the Nissan Prize for inventing superefficient ultralight-hybrid cars, to which ~$10 billion had been committed by 2000, and in 1999, partly for that work, the World Technology Award (Environment). He also received the 1997 Heinz Award, the 2000 Happold Medal of the Construction Industry Council, the 2005 Benjamin Franklin Medal of the Royal Society of Arts (Life Fellow), and in 2007, the Blue Planet Prize, Volvo Prize, honorary membership of the American Institute of Architects, Foreign Membership of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, Time International’s Hero of the Environment award, Popular Mechanics’ Breakthrough Leadership award, and honorary Senior Fellowship of the Design Futures Council. In 2008 he was named one of America’s 24 Best Leaders by U.S. News & World Report and Harvard’s Kennedy School, and received the first Aspen Institute / National Geographic Energy and Environment Award for Individual Thought Leadership. In 2009, he received the National Design Award (Design Mind), Time named him among the world’s 100 most influential people, and Foreign Policy, one of the 100 top global thinkers. In 2010, he was Runner-Up for the Zayed Future Energy Prize.

http://www.rmi.org/rfexecutivesummary

You can see an interview with him here.
http://www.nci.org/conf/clip-lovins.htm
An experimental physicist, educated at Harvard and Oxford, Mr. Lovins rose to prominence during the oil crises of the 1970s when, still in his 20s, he challenged conventional supply-side dogma by urging that the United States instead follow a "soft energy path." His controversial recommendations were eventually accepted by the energy industry, and his book, Soft Energy Paths: Toward a Durable Peace (1977) went on to inspire a generation of decision-makers. Lovins has received six honorary doctorates, a MacArthur Fellowship, the Heinz, Lindbergh and Right Livelihood awards, among other honors. His work today focuses on transforming the car, real-estate, electricity, water, semiconductor, and several other manufacturing sectors toward advanced resource productivity. He has briefed 12 heads of state, held several visiting academic chairs, authored or co-authored 27 books, and consulted for scores of industries and governments worldwide. The Wall Street Journal named Mr. Lovins one of 39 people world-wide "most likely to change the course of business in the '90s" .

http://www.rmi.org/rfexecutivesummary

[madokie]

39. I would say that Lovins has done more to save us energy than any other person

save for the inventor of the New Jersey molten salt reactor fella' that we don't see around here much anymore. Now there was someone who really knew his shit :puke:

[txlibdem]

46. Didn't Nader do more to save lives than anyone else long ago?

Now we remember him as the person who gave the election to Bush... Things change.

[madokie]

53. I'm not talking about NADER as in Ralph

You damn well know who I was referencing but you either are trying your luck at being funny or are in denial. Add another (N) to that name and you got it. :hi:

Does texass still belong to the usa or what? :-)
Thats why the wind blows so cold from the north here in Oklahoma cause, well you get it I'm sure if not I give up and you're beyond redemption.

[txlibdem]

54. Ok, let's say we're talking about someone that none of us knows

This man, in the long ago past, did and said things that were very agreeable to us. We thought he was a leader in the push toward renewable energy.

Then this man, writes a book where he says that it's time for renewable energy to "stand on its own in the market." Later he writes, "the invisible hand will decide if renewables are worth investing in or not."

And, as if that wasn't enough, we find that his livelihood comes from the oil and other fossil fuels industries.

What would you think of this man? Would you praise him for what he said in the past? Or would you look at him anew in the light of his apparent conversion over to the dark side, the fossil fuels side who have been fighting against subsidies for renewable energy with as much lobbyist might as they fight for THEIR OWN subsidies (which still dwarf the renewable subsidies by many times).

[madokie]

56. That has nothing to do with what I posted that you replied to that I corrected you on

Ralph Nader is not who I was referencing and nothing you say about him will change what I was saying. Neither was he the subject of your original post. :shrug:

I'll repeat, Amory Lovins has done more to help more people and companies to save energy than any one person I can think of and you should know that

[txlibdem]

59. All I'm saying is that you claim he gets to rest on his laurels and can do no wrong

I don't agree with what Lovins wrote. Renewable energy needs subsidies to get the industry fully on its feet. Once that happens *and* all other energy subsidies are removed then I don't care if they take away subsidies from renewable energy. But saying things right out of the right wing and oil company play book is NOT okay with me. At least not right now. Talk to me in 15 years and that will probably change -- renewables will be cheaper than any other source of power and there will be no discussion about which to use.

But as long as the fossil fuels industry receives free land to despoil, free mile upon mile of coastal waters, and many times the monetary incentives that renewables get I just can't agree with Lovins or, apparently you at this point. Sorry.


:hi:

[SpoonFed]

55. Why?

Why do you people give the poster the satisfaction of stirring the muck? It is quite clear from the first two words of the subject line that he doesn't have a clue what he is talking about; clearly doesn't understand what the Darwin Awards are, let alone anything regarding an ounce of credibility around these forums from well before his floating cities proposals.

Can you not see the frothing enjoyment this person gets from this nonsensical shit raking?
Why bother?

[Name removed]

38. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[bananas]

50. Nope - Amory Lovins has been proven right

He said that all nuclear energy sucks so bad that even all of Bush's handouts to the nuclear industry wouldn't result in a "rennaissance" - and he's been proven right.

That's one of the reasons the nuclear industry hates him so much - because he debunks their fairy tales - and he's right.

[txlibdem]

58. Meanwhile, Mr. Lovins has been proven wrong

He has not taken into account the past 30 years of technological advancements in nuclear reactor technology, specifically SMR and Thorium Cycle Reactors.

I, like you, want NO MORE LWRs, PWRs, or any variant that uses water to cool the reactor. I want only 100% passively safe designs that cannot have a meltdown (as long as the laws of physics stay the same -- and there's zero chance of them changing). I want only 100% mass produced reactors that will remove the profit from cost overruns and on-site "redesigns" etc.

Mr. Lovins takes none of these into account. He is railing against 40 year old technology. Well, me too!!! Let's have no more 1970 chevy pickups with the faulty gas tank, let's have no more Ford Pintos that burst into flames in a rear-end collision.

Stop fighting a 40 year old fight! Do you want us pro-nuclear DUers to look up in the archives the specs, cost,and efficiency data of 40 year old wind turbines, solar panels, etc. ??? I didn't think so.

Therefore, Mr. Lovins is wrong. He is saying we should never again build a thing that NOBODY wants to build, ever again.