Claiming that America's economy is lurching ever more quickly from economic bubble to economic bubble, the founder of iTulip predicts a surge in alternative energy and infrastructure spending – sort of a green bubble. Writing for Harper's [sub], Eric Janszen defined the main economic drivers of "the cleantech bubble:" the need to recover from recession, weakness in the dollar, loss of petrodollar liquidity, loss of energy security and peak cheap oil. As a result, consumers will be faced with a bewildering array of fuels and vehicles: biofuels, electric vehicles, plug-in hybrids, hydrogen fuel cells, photovoltaics, wind turbines, ocean wave energy, geothermal energy, clean coal and even nukes. Janszen sees these technologies becoming the hot, overvalued commodities of the new bubble. At the same time, he predicts corporations will plan and (God forbid) implement the new energy infrastructure to power expensive new vehicles and public transit. Responding in the Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas – USA , commentator Dave Cohen notes that venture capitalists (VC) are already looking to invest in what they call “the largest economic opportunity of the 21st century.” Fortunately for cutting edge companies like Tesla Motors, there's a VC born every minute.
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I heartily agree with the 1 1/2 paragraphs I can view for free. Would expect it to be much like the Internet/telecom bubble — sure there’s a lot of viable business but there’s also going to be a lot of companies go bust and a lot of overpriced stocks, as well as a lot of temporarily overpaid engineers and executives and inflation among constrained resources.
Which is why I shudder all the more every time some politician promises huge boondoggles or some pundit demands another “Manhattan Project” (as if the Manhattan project was assigned to develop a more efficient and market-viable economic resource, rather than a city-destroying war-ender) — there’s only a finite amount of people and resources qualified to work on these problems, and they probably already are.
Nukes, clean coal and wind turbines lumped in with hydrogen fuel cells and biofuels? Nukes are proven technology and with the new design/build/operate licensing can be cost competitive. In New England we get more than 20% of our power from nukes. Yes, I think Yucca Flats will do – nothing is perfect, but its a reasonable solution. I’d like some of the most elderly nukes to be replaced – everything does wear out. Ditto for coal burners. As for wind turbines, my son’s school derives 40% of their power from one whopping good sized wind turbine. We’ll know better about reliability after it goes some more years and also weathers the tail end of a hurricane….
Yeah, there probably will be a bubble, but bubbles can be useful.
Presidential candidate Barack Obama has proposed investing $150 billion (over 10 years) in “CleanTech” and another $60 billion in ‘infrastructure improvements’
http://www.barackobama.com/issues/energy/#invest-in-a-clean
Given that (as of Feb 2008) Obama seems to be the likely Democratic nominee and therefore the likely next President, at least some VCs will probably make money on this.
carbon tax. carbon tax. CARBON TAX. Then let the market decide where to put the investments in replacement technology.
“Health” was the best way to get fools to open their wallet…Now it will be “alternative energy”…Like taking tax-candy from a baby.
I heartily agree with this assessment. The lack of any clear path forward from oil, the involvment of Silicon Valley engineers and VC’s, plus the political might supporting some less than practical solutions garauntees a splintered market. The real scary thing is the inevitable costly, dubiously beneficial systems that will be implimented using our carbon taxed dollars, like Al Gore’s new mansion.
All I got from AGW was this lousy T-shirt, not even a decent energy policy.
Wind can certainly be done right, but the profit motive has so far led Mighty Wind to some environmentally brain-dead decisions. I know we’ll do “Clean” Coal and Nukes, but I’d rather see private industry have so much confidence that they put up the money themselves.
No NO NO! No more goddamn taxes. You hear me? No more! You want innovation in clean/renewable energy? End the ethanol mandate and subsidies and then let the market go to work. Make the barriers of entry less onerous (like for nuclear power in any of its forms) and you’ll be surprised how fast things will get done.