User:Woozle/positions/2013/climate change/solutions
0. research into gasoline synthesis. If you synthesize gasoline from new-grown biomass, that is a carbon-neutral process (the carbon you're burning was extracted from the air -- net atmospheric gain = 0).
There are processes to do this, but when gas was < $3/gallon at the pump, the price was too high. Take away the subsidies keeping that price low (see #6), and this should change -- if the existing rise in prices hasn't already crossed the line where synthesis is cost-effective.?
1. Heavy investment in solar, wind, and battery tech research and infrastructure
2. Sustainable energy generation and storage equipment used for personal use (i.e. not sold back to the grid) should not add to the tax value of one's home. (This should be based on how it was used solely over the past fiscal year.)
3. Gov should provide grants and/or guarantee loans for installing sustainable power equipment.
4. Tax the frack out of fossil fuel sales (but ramp it up gradually to minimize sticker shock and give people time to plan... maybe even adjust the tax to help keep the rise steady and avoid spikes.)
5. If possible, outlaw or severely restrict trading in fossil fuels futures (I don't see how this does any good, even in theory)
- Supposedly, the primary point of oil futures trading is that it allows {the haggling over {who gets to have the oil}} (i.e. product allocation) to be completed by the time it's actually produced, which seems like a good thing. I'm not completely convinced there isn't a better and simpler way to do this, but I'm taking it off the list for now.
6. Not one more cent for fossil fuel exploration (end all exploration subsidies)
7. Fracking should be illegal, nationwide. Maybe give existing operations some time to shut down... or maybe not. The companies don't deserve any profit from these operations, but some people will be out of work; we want to minimize the economic and personal shock from that.
8. Encourage retraining in sustainable energy tech -- grants for developing new tech school curricula? An "Energy Veterans Retraining Bill"? I'm not sure of the best way to do this, but we're going to need people who know the new tech, and we won't be needing people who know oil and nat-gas exploration (...except maybe a few to help with cleanup).