German Greens push for more coal

Germany should introduce nuclear tax to fuel competition: Greens

Cologne (Platts)--9Jan2008

Germany should introduce a tax of 2 euro cent/kWh on fuel rods for
nuclear power generation to re-establish the balance between different
generation sources, according to a Green party proposal published by
Suddeutsche Zeitung.

Citing a paper from the opposition party's energy expert Michael Schafer,
the newspaper said the suggested tax would create annual income of Eur 2
billion, increase costs for nuclear generation and with that possibly enforce competition.

The suggestion is based on the trade with emission rights: emitting units
receive a certain, limited, amount of emission allowances for free, which in
effect caps the time they are allowed to generate electricity at competitive prices. When their free rights run out, the operators have to buy rights on the market.

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This makes generation from lignite, hard coal and gas units more expensive than nuclear production. However, generators add the additional charges not only to fossil generation but also to nuclear fueling--resulting in billions of euros in windfall profits.

A tax on nuclear power would increase cost for nuclear generation, reduce
the profits of the operators while not resulting in additional cost for
consumers, said the Green party specialist.

http://www.platts.com/...

This is truly grand. The Greens are pushing environmental murder to feed their anti-nuclear religious beliefs. What can we make of this foolish notion that coal is better than nuclear. Clearly, all their whining about Co2 is so much fluff. What motivates them is being opposed to zero CO2 and zero particulate nuclear energy and not actually solving the worlds energy problems.

The German Greens, and, perhaps their US counterparts, need to seriously rethink their metaphysical belief that so-called "alternative" energy sources can solve humanity's growing energy issues.

Recently these issues were reflected in more anti-nuclear spots on various pro-Clinton blogs and even her official statements which, traditionally, have veered all over the place on the issue. It's not just German Greens but US Democrats that have had unified position on this not unlike the Greens in Germany and the US. Of course Obama comes from a state that produced half it's electricity from nuclear so he's walking a razor line on this. Recently, and to my happy surprise, super anti-Yucca mountain Nevada Senator Harry Reid came out FOR nuclear energy, especially advanced IV Generation R&D. To his credit, he showed a streak of independence on this from the fake-left anti-nuclear inquisitionists.

Hopefully more Democrats will start READING the facts on nuclear and not assume it's the second-coming of Adolf Hitler but represents the Albert Einstein future of the peaceful use of splitting atoms.

David