Guest “Just Say No” by David Middleton
A $240 PER GALLON GAS TAX TO FIGHT GLOBAL WARMING? NEW UN REPORT SUGGESTS CARBON PRICING
11:50 AM 10/08/2018
Michael Bastasch | Energy Editor
- A new U.N. report suggests a $240 per gallon gas tax equivalent is needed to fight global warming.
- The U.N. says a carbon tax would need to be as high as $27,000 per ton in the year 2100.
- If you think that’s unlikely to ever happen, you’re probably right.
A United Nations special climate report suggests a tax on carbon dioxide emissions would need to be as high as $27,000 per ton at the end of the century to effectively limit global warming.
For Americans, that’s the same as a $240 per gallon tax on gasoline in the year 2100, should such a recommendation be adopted. In 2030, the report says a carbon tax would need to be as high as $5,500 — that’s equivalent to a $49 per gallon gas tax.
If you think that’s an unlikely scenario, you’re probably not wrong. However, it’s what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s report, released Sunday night, sees as a policy option for reducing emissions enough to keep projected warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius.
[…]
From SR15…
In summary, new analyses are consistent with the AR5 and show that the price of carbon would need to increase significantly when a higher level of stringency is pursued (high confidence). Values vary substantially across models, scenarios and socio-economic, technology and policy assumptions. While the price of carbon is central to prompt mitigation pathways compatible with 1.5°C-consistent pathways, a complementary mix of stringent policies is required.
104 = 10,000
| Carbon tax per ton of CO2 | ||||
| Recent price | $25.00 | $30.00 | $27,000 | |
| Gasoline per gallon (retail) | $2.50 | $0.22 | $0.27 | $240 |
| Natural gas per mcf (residential) | $10.91 | $1.33 | $1.59 | $1,434 |
| Propane per gallon (residential) | $2.50 | $0.14 | $0.17 | $152 |
| Heating oil per gallon (residenial) | $3.07 | $0.25 | $0.30 | $270 |
| Kerosene per gallon (retail) | $3.29 | $0.24 | $0.29 | $260 |
| Coal per short ton (Powder River Basin) | $12.10 | $52.52 | $63.02 | $56,720 |
Effects of carbon tax on specific fuels
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So that is about $60 per litre, give or take a few centimes.
If anyone recalls or read History, during WWII there was very little gasoline available to the ordinary person wanting transport. The solution for two million vehicles was to convert them to wood gas. Modern wood gas conversions are pretty sophisticated. What I have not seen is conversions to coal gas because wood was more available and coal was also rationed.
Now that coal is the enemy I suspect there will emerge a coal gas alternative for vehicles using internal combustion possibly using a mix of biomass and coal powder. This could easily meet the CO2 emission requirements by adjusting the wood component to the available technology of the time.
In the back woods where moonshiners run, an underground coal supply will emerge with smokeless kilns making coke for engine fuel. The term ‘gas’ will take on the non-English meaning which is “gas”.
Effectively banning petroleum products as fuel will stimulate other fuel forms that are more under the control of the local populace. IPCC Revenuers will still be at high personal risk.
PS the typical income of a third world family is in the region of $240 a month so imposing that level of taxation of a US Gallon of fuel amounts to a crime against humanity. Somehow it seems broad support for the international criminal court (ICC) will balloon and include Americans, at least until the appropriate heads roll.
Crispin
“Effectively banning petroleum products as fuel will stimulate other fuel forms that are more under the control of the local populace. IPCC Revenuers will still be at high personal risk.”
Governments would be sued and there would be riots in the streets.
Hmmm……Lets do it!!!!…….Way hey!
To expand on your point, we’d surely see black market dealing in gasoline, and on a massive scale. If the IPCC’s goal is to create multi-trillion dollar criminal fossil fuel enterprises, with the concomitant power to control national governments, they will have succeeded.
I wish these people would take just one (non-socialist) economics course in college.
Please, please do not let Trudeau know about this suggestion……..
Contrary to most reactions here, this represents real and important progress and its very good news that it is being more or less explicitly stated.
The reason is that for the first time in a publication of this standing, one that is as widely read and paid attention to as this, the real implications of what the alarmists claim to believe are being recognized.
And as some are saying here, the real implication is the total elimination of the ICE and dramatic raises to electricity prices and all energy.
When you consider this seriously, its clear that its not just abolish the ICE vehicle base and carry on as usual. Because in this proposal, electricity also will be priced out of usage.
So the consequence of what they are advocating, claiming to be totally necessary to avoid the collapse of civilization, is large scale movement of people, into new dense energy efficient housing. Its the end of the shopping mall. Its massive price rises for all industrial products as energy prices become a huge part of their costs.
This always was the implication. But you could never get anyone to see it or think about it as long as the scale of the price increases or usage changes was not written down someplace by someone like the IPCC.
But now, there it is in writing. Basically, abolish ICE transport totally and eliminate most consumer goods and much of industry. And then make the rest of the changes that this will require.
As soon as its written down in the form of a proposed carbon tax it becomes impossible to dispute that these really are the implications.
So welcome it. They have really done the world a favor by finally coming clean on what they are advocating. They have finally got consistent, bringing their policy agenda into line with their theories. Well done them.
They have also done another major favor. They have predicted unequivocally that if we carry on with business as usual, we will have a disaster by 2030. Folks, that is close enough most of us will see if its true or not.
This is the crest of the global warming wave. Its downhill all the way from now.
While this sounds off subject, I would submit that it is consistent with what is occurring.
Something like nearly two decades ago I talked to someone researching major human predators. I had worked with fisheries and sharks a little and knew about the politically charged situation about commercial fishing. We understood both that fishing could and was too extensive in places and populations of some sharks were down, but also the politically incorrect view not out as one might say. A view developed that large shark populations were an absolute requirement for the health of the oceans.
This year a warning was issued for New England, and at least one survived attack and one fatal has occurred. A criminal investigation was started on a great white washed up on a California beach. Shark bites are not pretty, I saw a small one once. The excuse that they are rarer than lightning strikes is a common, probably with an appellation, avoidance of problem solving for whatever the true believer holds dear. The conclusion about this not being important because of its rarity may be comparable to other events now in the press.
A number of good biologists, whatever their motivations, became famous, as often discussed here, advocates for saving the world. This was aided with what we commonly see with the press about crises.
As to commercial fishing, in 1991, around when this nonsense started getting serious, an article in MARITIME LIFE AND TRADITIONS, no. 7, 2000, (now defunct), showed a picture of a burning wooden commercial fishing boat in Brittany, among many destroyed in Europe so they could not reenter the fishery.
Burning books and boats (and industries) may not be totally comparable, but scholars in the humanities ought to look into this. At least some of it smells like bigotry. It does make it difficult to correctly evaluate the status of marine populations, but some of us, many now deceased, have been trying with difficulty, sometimes to our detriment.
Oddly such extreme ideas are a ‘good thing ‘ because they are political poison and make those claiming them look a bit mad . The more ‘extreme ‘ they get the less chance there is no them making any ground at all.
The IPCC should be actively encouraged to ‘go for it ‘ has the very means to kill them off.
Ah but you have to remember, that is one of the Eco-Nazis’ big, but unspoken, goals – the “depopulation” (by starvation as economies collapse) so that there will be fewer humans to, you know, “abuse” the planet.
Hmm. If the IPCC says the world needs a $27,000 / tonne carbon tax, how long will it be before California announces they will impose a $35,000 / tonne tax — in order to “recapture world leadership”?
Have you missed what everyone else on your list has missed? $27,000/tone of CO2 is equal to $13.50/gal of gasoline.
I suppose I’m burdened with my undergraduate and graduate degree in Math. 🙂
apparently the burden is entirely too much for you.
burning 1 Gallon of gas creates about 20 pounds of carbon dioxide.
since a ton is 2000 pounds, it therefore takes 100 gallons to produce 1 ton of CO2.
at 27,000/ton the price per gallon is $27,000/100 gal or $270/gal not $13.50/gal as you some up miscalculated.
some *how* miscalculated. I sure do miss the edit button.
I should also note that the “about 20 pounds of carbon dioxide” depends on the “blend” of gasoline being used (the US mandates a different blend in winter than in summer for example). I’ve seen figures ranging from 17 to 20 pounds CO2 per gallon of gas (hence why my back of the envelop calculation of $270 is slightly higher than this articles $240). 20 makes for nice easy calculations that even someone burdened with “undergraduate and graduate degree in Math” should be able to understand, though I expect the $240/gal figure is probably the more accurate.
Re-doing my back of envelop calculation to take into consideration metric tonne instead of imperial ton, at approx. 20 pounds per gallon it takes roughly 110 gal. for a metric tonne (2204 pounds) which makes the $27,000/tonne = $27,000/110 gal. = approx $245/gal. Much closer to the articles $240 and still a long, long ways from chris’s erroneous $13.50
As everyone can see from this thread, no matter how you slice it, whether you go for a rough back of the envelope calculation (like I did) or for more precise calculations (along the lines of what Joel and David did), chris spectacularly failed at math here.
Chris,
Your math is way wrong.
1 US gallon is 3.7854 liters.
hexane density is 0.66 kg/liter
gasoline (hexane) thus is 2.5 kg/USgallon.
separately 1000 kg hexane, if burned completely with O2, produces 3,073 kg CO2.
[calculations for that:
hexane MW = 84 g/mole,
1E+06grams hexane = 11,627 moles hexane
6 carbons/hexane x 11,627 moles hexane = 69,767 moles carbon
CO2 MW= 44 g/mole
69,767 moles x 44 g/mole = 3,070 kg CO2/1,000 kg Hexane.
thus, the conversion ratio of CO2:hexane is 3.07.]
Thus, 3.07 grams of CO2 are produced for every 1 gram of hexane burned.
Continuing:
2.5 kg hexane/gallon x 3.07= 7.675 kg CO2/USgallon of hexane
1000 kg CO2 / (7.675 kg CO2/gallon hexane) = 130.3 gallons hexane
That is, 130.3 gallons of hexane will produce 1 metric tonne CO2.
1 metric tonne = 1,000 kg.
So if 1 metric tonne CO2 costs $27,000 in tax then:
$27,000 / 130.3 gallons gasoline =
$207.23/gallon hexane is your tax rate at $27,000 per metric tonne of CO2 produced.
correction: Hexane is 86 g/mole not 84. A typo.
[C6H14: (6 x 12)+(14×1)= 86 g/mole.]
All the calculated numbers shown are correct though.
Chris,
Your math is way wrong.
Indeed it is Joel. the burdened math degree holder simply divided the $27k price tag by the 2k pounds that is a ton and attributed that to a gallon of gas. What he forgot is that calculation only gets you the price per pound of CO2. He failed to then figure out how many pounds of CO2 is emitted from burning a gallon of gas which is the number he needs to multiple that $13.50 per pound in order to get the per gallon number.
keep in mind: All the carbon tax numbers thrown around are usually in SI units of metric tonne (=1000 kg) of CO2.
Still this is all just 11th grade high school chemistry stuff that Chris can’t seem to figure out. Sad.
excellent point Joel.
seeing “ton” in the article it is easy to assume it’s the imperial ton (2000 pounds) that was being referred to (which chris’s calculation clearly did despite his misspelling it tone) and not the metric tonne (approx 2204 pounds). Using either ton or tonne, chris still got it way wrong.
An alternative using balanced stoichiometry instead of the above calculation for the CO2:hexane ratio could be done as:
2 C6H14 + 19 O2 –> 12 CO2 + 14 H2O
Thus: 12x(MW CO2) / 2x(MW hexane) = 12(44)/2(86) = 3.07 conversion ratio
This says for every 1 gram hexane completely combusted it produces 3.07 grams CO2.
Gasoline isn’t pure hexane as it contains usually 10% EtOH crap, and some other additives, but this is close enough. Which explains the difference between exact hexane and the number Dave M gave.
Flunk math much?
8.89 kg CO2 per gallon of gasoline
1,000 kg per metric ton
$27,000.00 per metric ton CO2
$27.00 per kg CO2
$240.03 per gallon gasoline
While it only goes up to $50/to of CO2, this widget will do the math for you.
http://www.rff.org/blog/2017/calculating-various-fuel-prices-under-carbon-tax
Just interpolate between $25 and $30 and multiply by 1,000… you’ll get $240/gal.
Oh dear Chris,
You’ve rather shown yourself up maths-wise.
You must be rather embarrassed.
Ho ho!
Indeed. Notice chris hasn’t been back to defend his maths skills.
Looks like you should ask for your money back. That is, if you can figure out how much you paid.
Now we know why he’s so burdened by his Math degrees…. it’s because he pretty bad at math. LOL.
So, since most of these people believe in zero base budgeting, they are saying that it will cost somewhere north of 31 Trillion dollars per year (just based on US usage) to prevent catastrophe. I think it would cost less than a couple of year’s worth of US expenditures to build seawall defenses for the entire coastlines of the world. Once again they have shown that adaptation is cheaper than mitigation.
This is good news! Before, they always couched their proposed action as doable at a few % of GDP. Now that they have come completely out into the light they dont have to pretend. Probably at $240 a gallon, it will still be cheaper than windmills.
It must be tempting for the US administration to stop funding the IPCC and UNFCC, immediately.
Here’s an idea. add a line to the tax forms such that those who really believe in CAGW can check the box to add oh say 10% to their tax bill (those who don’t check the box add nothing to their tax bill) and *only* the money from that voluntary “CAGW tax” can be used to fund the IPCC, UNFCC, and other climate boondoggles. Let the greens put their tax money where their mouths are.
Well the carbon taxes are just the good intention bricks that pave the Road to Hell.
Oh today, it’s just $30/ton, then in a few years, $40/ton. Then hey “why not $80/ton?” Then $100, then $200.
The socialism steadily takes hold spending OPM. Who gets the money? The Tom Steyer’s and Rockefellers’, that’s who. The elites who tell the masses they are too ignorant to know how to handle their own affairs. It becomes the self-fulling prophecy. It all sounds great until the OPM starts to run out as the society is dis-incentivized to work, to prop up the elites. It comes full circle back to Czar and his inner circle controlling the masses before the revolution.
Capitalism, free-market capitalism, with minimal taxes, is the only economic system ever devised that seems to break that cycle of socialism-revolution-socialism, and it has done so by creating a large, empowered middle class with ownership and liberties the government cannot touch. And it the the socialists, the climate change socialists, who want to break capitalism.
I like breathing. Turns out I emit about 1 Kg per day CO2, or nearly a half tonne per year. With 7.3 Billion people on the planet, that is about 3.5 billion tonnes with all humanity just breathing, and all of humanity CO2 emissions is about 40 Gt per year. So humans just breathing is about 8% of all human emissions. Yes, I know we are just recycling the biosphere, but that is really all we are doing with everything else on vast timescales.
How much is it going to cost me to just keep breathing?
Do they realize that even modest increases in fuel prices cause social upheaval, riots and civil war?
For example, the truckers’ strike in Brazil this year paralyzed the country and one of the reasons was that diesel prices at 4 USD/gallon were considered unbearable…
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/05/brazil-truckers-roads-president-temer-economy
This is definitely a jump-the-shark moment for the ipcc.
I’ve come up with a solution to the problem. Disband the IPCC
Does it matter how much something costs in dollars? It all depends on someone’s income in dollars. And the way they are inflating the dollar it is probable it will cost even much more in dollars.
The question should be how much would it cost in something stable like gold or a liter of whiskey?
https://inflationdata.com/articles/inflation-adjusted-prices/inflation-adjusted-gasoline-prices/
By the year 2100 with inflation as it happens. 240 bucks won’t buy you a ham sandwich. See Venezuela. But it’s nice to think that we will still have gasoline powered cars by then. What happened to peak oil?
Discussing chaos CAGW policies would be boring, except the Zombies are making some progress in taking over our legal system to force their country (Netherland) to follow a Greenpeace type group’s Zombie CAGW plan.
The CAGW Zombies’ plan is use the legal system force to force a carbon tax, which will be spent on more wind and solar gathering, regardless of engineering facts.
German CO2 emissions have not gone down in 9 years, even though massive amounts have been spent for more wind and sun gathering.
The CAGW Zombies would if they were not Zombies and develop a plan that is based on engineering reality.
Instead of fighting to make us follow the CAGW Zombie plan, they (those people who are pushing the CAGW Zombie cause) would be looking at the next best alternative to forced CAGW economic collapse. We have run out of money to waste, countries are starting to fail.
Yup, it’s a Molten Salt reactor. And the funny thing is this is not an engineering breakthrough in the traditional sense.
There is a molten salt reactor (the reactor in question is the first reactor to reach phase 2, regulatory in Canada approval, expected construction, three sites later this decade, with no push) whose calculated cost of fuel is 1 cent per Kw-hr.
How much energy can you buy for 1 cent?
The CO2 running cost of an optimum molten salt reactor is essentially zero.
If the CAGW threat was really real and/or if the CAGW team was not led by Zombies, the right and the left would have found the problem’s logical common ground.
The CAGW problem needs a safe, high efficient zero carbon energy source that could be mass produced and used in all countries in the world.
Any way back to the Zombies fight to force the legal system to make us follow the Zombies’ plan that does not work.
https://www.afp.com/en/news/826/dutch-court-tells-government-slash-greenhouse-gas-doc-19w2tu1
I demand the elimination of the IPCC, at their cost.
Number’s like this are sure to get people’s attention. It’s also assured to get you ignored by any rational person.
The IPCC needs to read a few more fairy tails and a few less government funded climate reports. They may actually learn something.
Hi David Middleton,
just trying to work this one out.
If a 1 US gallon of gasoline weighs 4.03 kg.
How does it change to 8.89 kg CO2 per gallon of gasoline once used by a car?.
“8.89 kg CO2 per gallon of gasoline
1,000 kg per metric ton
$27,000.00 per metric ton CO2
$27.00 per kg CO2
$240.03 per gallon gasoline”
1C + 2O → CO2
Molecular weight:
O = 16
C = 12
The C comes from gasoline, the O2 comes from the atmosphere.
Chemical equation for combustion of octane:
2[C8H18] + 25[O2] → 16[CO2] + 18[H2O]
Sounds like a great plan! Lets us slap that tax on all who support it, first, and make it retro active to the year of their birth.
Even a $10/ gal carbon tax would cause a civil war in N America.