November 11, 2011 – Knowledge Problem

California Regulators Approve Generous Contract to Multinational Corporation at California Ratepayer Expense

Electricity, Environmental policy, Politics, Regulation / By Michael Giberson

Michael Giberson Discovering that renewable power mandates can be expensive, California-style: “California Approves Solar Contract Despite High Cost“: Ultimately, the commissioners voted for Abengoa’s contract mainly because Abengoa already has spent five years and $70 million to develop Mojave Solar and has gotten all the permits and financing to start construction. They noted that getting …

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Hotelling Takedown

Economics / By Michael Giberson

Michael Giberson One of the classics of resource economics is Harold Hotelling’s “The economics of exhaustible resources,” Journal of Political Economy (1931). The article gave us what is now called “Hotelling’s rule,” which links resource prices and extraction rates for resources in finite supply. The article was simple, logical, and pathbreaking. It also, by the …

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Pipelines and Politics, or “Flow My Tears, but Not in a Pipeline Crossing U.S. Borders Because We’ll Never Get the Permit Approved at the State Department”

Energy markets, Politics, Regulation / By Michael Giberson

Michael Giberson A few days ago, Geoffrey Styles was assessing the potential role of energy issues in the 2012 U.S. presidential election: Even though $4 gasoline was still fresh in the minds of voters, energy played only a minor role in the outcome of the 2008 election, overshadowed by two wars and a crippling financial crisis. Will …

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