Mercurial Management of Metals & other Materials

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-205_162-57564846/treaty-to-reduce-mercury-emissions-signed/ Various nations have now signed a meaningless agreement to reduce mercury emissions, since many of the same, inc. the some of the biggest users of electricity (for, among other things, artificial light) such as the US, UK, & EU, have made incandescent bulbs illegal so that compact fluorescent bulbs (CFLs), which primarily contain mercury gas instead of the harmless, inert argon present in incandescents, are the only economical alternative. Now CFLs will be produced in massive numbers until LEDs, halogens, or some safer alternative becomes inexpensive enough to compete. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase-out_of_incandescent_light_bulbs

Propping Up Failures

http://www.azbex.com/archives/view/az_corporation_commission_approves_power_agreement/
The Phoenix Business Journal shows that the AZ Corporation Commission has decided to give an unfair advantage to solar companies selling power to Arizona schools by exempting them from standard regulations so they don't have to follow the rules of standard utilities. Thus, while utilities have to struggle to get every necessary rate increase approved by the ACC, meet specified percentages of "renewable" energy, and pay taxes, the ACC's pet companies are more profitable by escaping these onerous regulations. Effectively, the rest of the utilities have to pay higher taxes to support these favored companies.

In similar news, tax dollars are supporting corn farmers:
http://www.grist.org/article/2010-03-25-corn-ethanol-meat-hfcs/

And the city of Glendale is helping support a failing franchise (Coyotes):
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2010/05/14/20100514glendales-phoenix-coyotes-guarantee-nhl.html

http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/18/news/companies/auto_bailout/
The US gov't gave $40B to GM & Chrysler so GM could build a $40k car that only goes 40 miles before needing a recharge (while the Nissan Leaf goes 100 miles between charges & costs only $33k).

Is is any wonder we have an exploding debt and no jobs when the gov't sucks money out of viable companies that could be hiring to prop up failures?

Kyl Emphasizes Water Waste in Proposed Solar System

http://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/stories/2010/06/21/story3.html?b=1277092800^3527121&s=industry&i=green

Sen. Kyl is to be applauded for reminding us that this is a desert and water cannot be treated as a trivial consideration in the evaluation of power generation alternatives.

China Kills More Miners than US

Sorry for such a cynical title; I'm in a hurry to get to work & couldn't take time for a better title. And I'm only including this in the Solar blog to keep the number of blogs manageable, w/ the connection being that coal is another energy source.

Aside from that, I think the article basically speaks for itself. On our end, I think we're mistaken to chastize only Massey when the gov't was sleeping at the switch -- over 500 citations in one year and you don't shut a mine down after about 100? But perhaps I'm speaking out of turn, not being an expert on the issue. Maybe these were all minor citations ... but then why does gov't waste so much time & money on minor citations if they're not actionable? There I go again, criticizing w/o knowing enough to judge properly. Maybe I had too much coffee ... off to get ready for work.

Rich Borrowing from "Poor"?

In "Beijing signals climate concession," (Financial Times cover story, Dec. 14, 2009), Fiona Harvey called China a poor country ("China and other poor countries", parag. 6). In the same sentence she labeled the US a rich country. The US currently owes China $800B. When's the last time you heard of the rich borrowing from the poor?

Update: AZ Solar Industry Deregulated

http://bit.ly/2B74S8

Sustainable Energy & Agriculture Impose Unsustainable Load on Weak Economy

$2.4B: http://www.cleantechgreentech.com/news/directory/christian-science-monitor-scitech/816486

$28B: http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/17/obama-signs-stimulus-packed-with-clean-energy-provisions/

$300B: http://sustainableagriculture.net/

The taxes required to fund these & other spending will suck funds from an economy that's already hemhorraging money. And much of this spending is wrapped in the "Recovery" Act. This is like Orwell's 1984 where what the gov't says is the opposite of what it means.