[davep]

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/may/18/fossil-fuel-companies-getting-10m-a-minute-in-subsidies-says-imf?CMP=share_btn_tw

Fossil fuel companies are benefitting from global subsidies of $5.3tn (£3.4tn) a year, equivalent to $10m every minute of every day, according to a startling new estimate by the International Monetary Fund.

The IMF calls the revelation “shocking” and says the figure is an “extremely robust” estimate of the true cost of fossil fuels. The $5.3tn subsidy estimated for 2015 is greater than the total health spending of all the world’s governments...

[ROCKMAN]

As it should be, of course. Consumers are contributing to the development of fossil fuels upon which they are so dependent. Seems fair to me: without the subs fewer wells would be drilled and fewer folks would have access to affordable energy.

[KaiserJeep]

I welcome comment by anyone who has renounced Fossil Fuel use by:

1) Not using any electricity you don't get from renewable resources.

2) Not owning or ever riding in a diesel or gasoline powered vehicle.

3) Does not use or buy petrochemical-sourced plastics, electronics, etc.

4) Never buys food from more than 50 miles or so from your house, transported to you by oil fuels.

....I could keep going, but you get the point. Even in the richest large country in the world, we can't afford not to use FF's.

[dissident]

I welcome comment by anyone who has renounced Fossil Fuel use by:

1) Not using any electricity you don't get from renewable resources.

2) Not owning or ever riding in a diesel or gasoline powered vehicle.

3) Does not use or buy petrochemical-sourced plastics, electronics, etc.

4) Never buys food from more than 50 miles or so from your house, transported to you by oil fuels.

....I could keep going, but you get the point. Even in the richest large country in the world, we can't afford not to use FF's.

What vapid prattle. You deliberately confuse will to collective action requiring 20 years or more to transform the energy use of society with instantaneous personal lifestyle changes. Obviously these are not equivalent and anyone who thinks they are is an idiot.

[dissident]

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/may/18/fossil-fuel-companies-getting-10m-a-minute-in-subsidies-says-imf?CMP=share_btn_tw

Fossil fuel companies are benefitting from global subsidies of $5.3tn (£3.4tn) a year, equivalent to $10m every minute of every day, according to a startling new estimate by the International Monetary Fund.

The IMF calls the revelation “shocking” and says the figure is an “extremely robust” estimate of the true cost of fossil fuels. The $5.3tn subsidy estimated for 2015 is greater than the total health spending of all the world’s governments...

Wow, that is mind boggling. I recall Bush bitching that global warming action in the USA would cost $400 billion and that wasn't even per year. Here we see how much welfare these corporate maggots are leeching from the public purse every year.

If $5.2 trillion per year is not a market distortion then nothing is.

[ROCKMAN]

"If $5.2 trillion per year is not a market distortion then nothing is." Of course it distorts the market. Just think how much more the Rockman could be selling his production for if the consumers weren't getting as many wells drilled as a result of the $5.2 trillion per year they weren't contributing to the effort to develop fossil fuels.

Stop the subs! Stop the subs! LOL.

[KaiserJeep]

-snip-
What vapid prattle. You deliberately confuse will to collective action requiring 20 years or more to transform the energy use of society with instantaneous personal lifestyle changes. Obviously these are not equivalent and anyone who thinks they are is an idiot.

You AGW fanboys have been prattling on about carbon-dioxide for 20+ years and as a result we are approaching a new record for oil and gas production in this country. Maybe the true idiots are those that cannot accept that personal economics will trump other considerations, every time.

But then maybe you own only a BEV and charge it with solar or wind or hydropower. Maybe you labor in a vegetable patch, and never eat anything else. Maybe you gave up high tech and plastics and modern medicines. Maybe you spin your own yarn and even sleep with your Alpacas. Maybe you are not yourself a hypocritical idiot with unrealistic expectations.

[Outcast_Searcher]

I welcome comment by anyone who has renounced Fossil Fuel use by:

1) Not using any electricity you don't get from renewable resources.

2) Not owning or ever riding in a diesel or gasoline powered vehicle.

3) Does not use or buy petrochemical-sourced plastics, electronics, etc.

4) Never buys food from more than 50 miles or so from your house, transported to you by oil fuels.

....I could keep going, but you get the point. Even in the richest large country in the world, we can't afford not to use FF's.

What vapid prattle. You deliberately confuse will to collective action requiring 20 years or more to transform the energy use of society with instantaneous personal lifestyle changes. Obviously these are not equivalent and anyone who thinks they are is an idiot.

Right. Because calling people names makes you smart.

But of course, we can't get on the far left for, say, flying all over the planet to attend "green" conferences, because that would point out how vapid and hypocritical THEY are. We can't point out that Al Gore should stop lecturing everyone ELSE on how they should have a smaller energy footprint and first reduce HIS energy footprint by, say, an ORDER OF MAGNITUDE.

I am NOT an AGW denier, and am all for green energy once it becomes competitive at scale (without large subsidies). Even while shrieking how ignorant climate change denialists are, it's interesting how excited the far left gets when people point out how they are unwilling to make the same PERSONAL sacrifices re fossil fuel use they claim we "all must make" for "moral" reasons.

I guess with poster boy Al Gore in the mix, it must be a bit embarrassing.

Be sure to call me an idiot several times as you deny the far left sacrifices FAR less than it screams at climate denialists -- after all, it gives you so much credibility.

[Apneaman]

rockman, sounds like a socialist project. Universal petroleum care.

So, adjusting for the subs and debt what is the real EROEI of oil?

[kublikhan]

Fossil fuel companies are benefitting from global subsidies of $5.3tn.

The vast sum is largely due to polluters not paying the costs imposed on governments by the burning of coal, oil and gas. These include the harm caused to local populations by air pollution as well as to people across the globe affected by the floods, droughts and storms being driven by climate change. The biggest single source of air pollution is coal-fired power stations and China, with its large population and heavy reliance on coal power, provides $2.3tn of the annual subsidies.

Sounds like they tried to come up with a dollar value for storm damage, floods, droughts, air pollution, etc. This is not exactly what most people would consider a subsidy. Seems misleading to me.

[Apneaman]

The only time I hear Al Gore's name mentioned is by corns and deniers. I never saw his little movie because I don't listen to politicians of any stripe, but it's my understanding that the movie was only a climate change primer. Al Gore is the boogeyman of the American right and the left has the Kochs. I guess being born and raised in the country that refined propaganda to a science then unleashed it on the citizenry to a degree unmatched in history resulted in a majority of the population becoming political extremists. How come so few Americans can't see that applying a rigid dogma to every single problem (blame or solve) is completely ridiculous?

Often wrong, but never uncertain.

[KaiserJeep]

I do not equate advertising with propaganda, myself. For one thing, there are "truth in advertising" laws to protect consumers.

Sadly, there are no such protections in either the Web or for that matter in scientific journals.

The most that happens to some "scientist" who manufactures data by falsifying research is his peers criticize him in the peer review process. As long as his bogus conclusions agree with current politics, he still gets his grant money, no matter his academic reputation.

On the Web there are no consequences whatsoever for writing BS. There is a lot of it here in this Forum. Sometimes a member gets a figurative raspberry from another member, big deal.

Now I HAVE seen Al Gore's movie. I have seen him flying around in a private 727 spewing tons of carbon dioxide on every trip. I have seen him selling shares of a carbon sequestration scheme that would inject liquid carbon dioxide into deep water wells under the sea. I have seen him riding around in a Mercury automobile as big as a tuna boat. I have seen his family compound and heard about his rampant FF consumption.

In other word, he is famous for environmental hypocrisy. Same flaw as many PO.com members.

[Apneaman]

"I do not equate advertising with propaganda"

Why would you? Both use tricky language, image and symbolism to enact an emotional response for advantage. Oh yeah they are nothing alike. Edward Bernays made a fortune off minds like yours Kaiser. You just make shit up. I disagree with others around here like rockman and outcast searcher, I think they have major blind spots, but they are intelligent, ask questions and make valid points, while you on the other hand are just a boring parrot. Often wrong, but never uncertain.

[ROCKMAN]

A - "So, adjusting for the subs and debt what is the real EROEI of oil?". That's the great thing about producing oil/NG for a living: I don't have to worry about EROEI. I spend $X to drill wells and sell production for $Y. So as long as $Y is significantly more than $X my owner is happy. As they say: "Happy owner...happy life". LOL

[rdberg1957]

The issue of subsidies for fossil fuels are important to track, especially if they are growing. I don't think there is a one-one relationship between fossil fuels becoming too costly to produce and EROEI. However, I would hazard a guess that there is a substantial correlation between costs and EROEI. Rockman is correct, I think, that EROEI has no direct bearing on the economic life of producers. It is indirect, but will matter eventually. It is unwise and hypocritical to demand that solar and wind power and wind operate without subsidies while fossil fuel has immense subsidies. We really can't tell how viable one source of power is compared to another without knowing the extent to which subsidies support the production and distribution of each.

I don't believe we can wean ourselves off of fossil fuels completely. However, I do believe that it is advisable that we markedly reduce the rate at which we use coal and oil. I don't think questions of survival are best answered by the "free market." The mix of power sources may include all that we presently know about, but if we wish to keep the planet habitable for us, we need to radically change the total amount of energy we consume and which sources we use the most.

Peak oil is one of a number of converging environmental and economic problems with the potential to become crises at the same time (overpopulation, resource depletion of all kinds [water, fossil fuel, land, habitats for a great deal of animal life], and climate change) which may overwhelm our ability to adapt.

[dissident]

People sure love their comforting delusions. How exactly are independent lifestyle changes supposed to cosmically align to produce a macro scale phase change? Let that question sink into that drone brain, full of tropes and talking points dished out by preachers of the faith such as Rush Limbaugh. I hear this "every man is totally independent of his world" dogma from the so-called right wing and think, they can't all believe this fairy tale for babies can they? It's like believing you personally select the products on offer at any store. I guess that means the average American chose to have his goods manufactured in China. It wasn't the corporations and the retailers, it was Joe Q Average and his mythical power over the world.

To produce change at the macro scale requires collective action. I used that dirty word "collective" which certain drones react to violently due to all the Pavlov's dogs conditioning they have had. Organization and coordination are required to have all the powerless individuals change the base of the modern economy. It's not going to happen as a stochastic process through mass market demand. Put another way, it's business as usual until the conditions make it impossible to proceed. But then it is too late.