Before you write me off as an ignorant "climate change denier", I urge you to read this article with an open mind. I have no intention to sway your belief one way or another regarding our planet's climate and what affect humanity has on it. My objective is merely to provoke the question of how much we risk by allowing our government to take part in the resolution of this issue and whether or not there are possibly better, more efficient, options in achieving the "clean air utopia" so many of us dream about.
Presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders received much support for his plan to combat climate change. While Senator Sanders may have the best of intentions with this plan, the policies he wishes to implement seem to leave a door open for cronyism. I have no argument against the plan to end the subsidizing of "fossil fuel corporations." However, I don't think we should take those subsidies and immediately give them to "clean energy" corporations. We know he aims to subsidize these corporations because he mentions "investing in clean energy" thirty-three times throughout the plan while only mentioning returning money to consumers twice. What is concerning about this part is that he mentions increasing taxes several times (which will lead to an increase in prices) and he never specifies exactly which consumers he is returning this money to.
When asked how he plans to pay for all of his promises, Senator Sanders loves to talk about taxing the richest one percent of citizens. But, there's only so much we can take from those people before they either run out of money, or leave the country. After that, we will have to move to taxing those that earn less than the richest one percent to continue to pay for these programs. Even if you're not concerned with these risks, keep in mind that no matter how much of a saint Bernie Sanders may or may not be, the majority of his colleagues cannot be trusted to work with these corporations without exploiting their power to regulate the market. Once we give our government power, we can't be certain they will use it in the way we intend them to nor can we be certain that we will ever be able to take the power back.
What are some solutions that eliminate the threat of climate change that do not involve government mandated regulation? Well, it starts with voter education. We need to address the ability of energy companies to influence our politicians. Politicians that use their position to pass regulations favoring these companies in return for monetary favors need to be exposed and face criminal charges. We need to remove regulations that hinder the growth and research of innovative technologies in all areas of the energy sector, be they petroleum, coal, nuclear, solar, etc. We need to understand that fuel production efficiency is valuable with our current infrastructure while we perfect renewable energy technologies. So far, the "pending doom" predictions have been far less than accurate. Therefore, it is safe to assume that we do have some time to weigh our options and allow innovation to fully mature before we ween ourselves off of current energy sources.
We could also try allowing the free market to work the way it was intended to. A free market has the ability to produce a solution none of us have thought of, yet. Tesla's power wall is a recent example of this ability. Products that allow individuals to produce their own renewable energy are cleaner than previous technologies and are on their way to being more cost effective as well. I believe most people will support the option to produce their own energy at lower costs. Allowing informed consumers to make their own energy decisions without force normally leads to low cost, efficient, and safe products.
The only legitimate argument is not against renewable energy, it's against the plan to take money from taxpayers and competing technologies to invest it in whatever company hires the most lobbyists and offers the best political gain. If you want money invested into renewable energy research, invest in companies doing that research. Getting politicians involved will only lead them to regulate based on what is popular rather than what is fair. Meanwhile, we continue to find ourselves arguing over whether or not climate change exists and what causes it. Instead, lets aim for lower energy costs, more energy jobs, and technological advancement. These are goals we can all agree on. We just need to address each other's concerns and agree on how to meet our collective goals.