What’s needed

The insufficient rebate program must be improved to meet the needs of those most vulnerable to the effects of rising energy costs.We also recommend long-term no-interest loans for the purchase of renewables. This would allow energy consumers to continue to pay a rate, but an affordable one, and with a stabilized future, all the while becoming less dependent on non-renewable resources.

We’re already essentially ‘paying back’ the cost of coal-fired power plants every time we receive a Nova Scotia Power bill. No one is expected to buy twenty-five years worth of oil or coal all at once. Why, then, when we purchase a solar panel, are we expected to pay all at once for the twenty-five years worth of access to solar energy?

This has created the illusion that conventional energy is cheap compared to the staggering upfront costs of renewable technology. In reality, it costs us in the long-term, since fossil fuels are a cost we never fully pay off. With renewables, ‘payback’ comes to an end. (And doesn’t come with the huge environmental costs associated with global warming.)

Greater investment in a ‘green energy’ sector would not only be part of a responsible response to the climate crisis, it would amount to a job creation program. Germany’s green-energy sector has created about $240-billion in annual revenues and employs a quarter-million Germans, on track to becoming the country’s biggest employer.

Posted by Mike Targett | Email a comment