Chapter 12

externalities

The U.S. National Research Council have put out a thorough assessment of the externalities of energy: The Hidden Costs of Energy: Unpriced Consequences of Energy Production and Use (2010). It’s a bit old, but I still refer to it quite a bit.

This Forbes article lists "deaths per kW-hour" of various types of fuel.  Unsurprising, coal is the most dangerous.  This article also has a good bibliography of sources for this kind of information.  

carbon tax vs. cap and trade

I argued in this chapter that a carbon tax and cap-and-trade system were fundamentally equivalent. Yet some people who strongly support action to reduce emissions truly hate cap and trade. See one argument here. While a few good points are made, I think they are being a bit too harsh on that policy.  On the other hand, most economists view a carbon tax as the best approach.  The U.S. Congressional Budget Office has released a detailed analyses of impact of a carbon tax on emissions and the economy.

One of the great ironies of the present debate is the vociferous opposition of U.S. Republicans to cap and trade. This article explains how the concept of cap-and-trade first emerged from the Reagan White House as a way for the free market to solve environmental problems. Times have indeed changed!  Richard Conniff, “Blue Sky Thinking: The Political History of Cap and Trade,” Smithsonian Magazine, August 2009.