I thought coal was back

Samm · 2019-10-30T03:44:39.738Z

sikofit:

Yeah 1 new plant in the entire country while company after compnay declares bankruptcy is hardly “doing fine”

I said “doing fine here” not “doing fine.”

Hexenbiest · 2019-10-30T04:48:12.365Z

China and India is picking up were the west left off with coal, except at a much scarier level.

WildRose · 2019-10-30T05:15:11.505Z

No, the people of the state own equal shares of the resources which are extracted by private companies that bid on them.

LucyLou · 2019-10-30T05:36:25.361Z

Samm:

sikofit:

Yeah 1 new plant in the entire country while company after compnay declares bankruptcy is hardly “doing fine”

I said “doing fine here” not “doing fine.”

Well that’s good.

Because it’s not “doing fine”.

You are correct.

westaussie · 2019-10-30T11:47:29.878Z

Hilarious.

westaussie · 2019-10-30T11:50:05.412Z

Perhaps Trump should return the donations so they can be used to pay some of the debts owing.

sikofit · 2019-10-30T14:39:22.925Z

Samm:

sikofit:

Yeah 1 new plant in the entire country while company after compnay declares bankruptcy is hardly “doing fine”

I said “doing fine here” not “doing fine.”

Are you really trying to assert that you weren’t trying to refute the OP and merely relaying an meaningless anecdote ?

Samm · 2019-10-30T21:47:01.463Z

westaussie:

Hilarious.

I’m sure you thought that you were making a valid point, but as it turns out you weren’t.

H_Arendt · 2019-10-30T21:52:41.603Z

wiley8425:

It’s not socialism, it’s capitalism. Money in exchange for goods. Socialism would be giving oil companies unfettered rights “for the common good.”

So now enabling privately held companies is socialism? Really?

Samm · 2019-10-30T21:54:01.110Z

sikofit:

Samm:

sikofit:

Yeah 1 new plant in the entire country while company after compnay declares bankruptcy is hardly “doing fine”

I said “doing fine here” not “doing fine.”

Are you really trying to assert that you weren’t trying to refute the OP and merely relaying an meaningless anecdote ?

Nope. But since you take offense at your interpretation. Look at US coal exports … they are up considerably since 2006. In fact they are higher now than the previous historic peak export year of 1981. “Doing fine” is subjective at best.

wiley8425 · 2019-10-30T23:15:15.671Z

They wouldn’t be private companies. They’d be publicly owned.

Steel-W0LF · 2019-10-31T02:47:10.972Z

I’m fine with coal being replaced by better forms of energy.

What I’m against is the government artificially making coal less viable while at the same time trying to force new energy to be viable.

It’ll happen when new technology is ready. It would be like if in the 80s government implemented policies to make landline phones more expensive and mobile phones cheaper. The tech wasn’t ready for the shift, but now it has basically happened on its own.

westaussie · 2019-10-31T05:27:54.281Z

It is hilarious that you think that the start date of the construction is not relevant.

wiley8425 · 2019-10-31T06:36:33.753Z

If their state is cool with it, it’s none of my business. Or yours.

Samm · 2019-10-31T08:13:33.198Z

westaussie:

It is hilarious that you think that the start date of the construction is not relevant.

What do you think that the relevance would be? Coal use has been on the decline in this country for decades. However, the plant just constructed a mile from my house took about 3 years from ground breaking to operation. The other plant was a modern refit of an older fluidized bed demonstration plant that had never been certified. The refit took about four years. So make your point if you have one.

westaussie · 2019-10-31T08:15:02.099Z

The point is self-evident.

Samm · 2019-10-31T08:22:38.808Z

Klaxton:

Samm:

Gosh. I don’t know. It seems to be doing just fine here. A new coal power plant just went on line this summer about a hundred miles down the road and another one is in warm-up test status not a mile from my house.

Any chance that will cut into the socialist checks all Alaskans receive from the oil revenue just for being alive?

That would be a shame.

Sorry, I missed this one until just now.

There is no chance whatsoever that new coal power plants will affect anything but the rate we pay for power. Coal is cheap and abundant and until gas is piped from the North Slope to the railbelt (a 40 year old unfulfilled promise) where most of the people live, coal will continue to be a major component of the energy grid in the State.

The only shame is how ignorant you are about the source of funding for the “socialist checks” each Alaskan receives.

Samm · 2019-10-31T08:34:24.750Z

wiley8425:

Alaska’s Permanent Fund was established by a constitutional amendment passed by voters in 1976 requiring a portion of state oil revenues to be put into a savings account to be available for the distant future, when North Slope oil fields are tapped out.

Voters voted it in. Representatives actually representing their constituents. I’m not seeing the problem here.

The Permanent Fund, which you described above, and the Permanent Fund Dividend, that Klaxon was referring to, are two very different things. The former is enshrined in the Constitution by Amendment, whereas the Dividend was established by statute in 1982 and the payout must be approved by each successive Legislature just like any other appropriation. Also, the Dividend is not paid out of the Permanent Fund, it is paid out of a portion of the return on investment of the Fund. Most of the money currently in the Permanent Fund is the result of investment earnings and direct deposits by the Legislature, not from oil taxes.

Samm · 2019-10-31T08:39:59.890Z

dantes:

Yep. Which is why it’s akin to socialism since the state owns the means of production.

No. The State owns the land and the resource and the oil companies own the means of production. The oil companies pay the State (or the Feds depending on who manages the land) for mineral leases and a royalty on the oil they produce.

Samm · 2019-10-31T08:48:54.910Z

dantes:

Land is a means of production. How much production they going to do without state land?

If the State was in the business of producing oil, you would be right. But they aren’t, so they sell leases for the right to drill for oil to the people who do have the means to produce it, and they take a healthy share of the produced oil in the form of royalties. It’s no different than if you owned a forest of Douglas Fir, but had no ability to cut and transport the trees to market, so you contract with a logging company to do it for you and they pay you some agreed to price for each tree. But that does not make you a wood producer.