[Vision2020] Building and development planning

[Pat Kraut]

I heard an interesting viewpoint about the high oil prices yesterday...blame
the environmentalists!
No refinerys, no new drilling and many more. Not Bush actually not even
Clinton except that he cowtowed so badly to the the environmentalists.
It isn't the 'big oil' people it is a farce of bad planning for many years.
PK


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Phil Nisbet" <pcnisbet1 at hotmail.com>
To: <vision2020 at moscow.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 16, 2005 12:54 PM
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Building and development planning


Ted

I really do not think you understand freemarket conservation or its ideas.

The principle problem here is the efforts put forward by many parties to
block or halt market entry for worthwhile conservation and a major failure
to come up with ways to give us full environmental cost accounting.

I will give you the example from right here in Latah County that I have
mentioned previously.

We are burning a half million gallons of deisel fuel a year to drag sands
and gravels up from the Snake River.  That is a material that in a majority
of towns is produced at the edge or town and for most of Idaho the cost of a
20-40 sand sells for about $6.75 a ton.  Our sand here goess for $18.00 a
ton with the majority of that cost related specifically to the long haul
that the samd takes to get here from the river.

But entry to produce that material here is now being blocked by regulations
and the reason has very little to do with a complete environmental cost
accounting, the weighing of environemtnal risks and benefits.  Its all about
the dread and fear that people have of anything called minng and minerals.
Yet those same individuals are still using the products hauled in from
distant locations.

People in the local area would have to agree to bike a million miles a year
to replace that lost fuel.  They are also spending a couple million dollars
a year in extra costs to get the sands we use in the local area.

Each new house built uses 90 tons of sand for its concrete and another 100
tons of sands drainfields and further sands for yard base and for mortor
work and the rest.  Concrete repair, commercial construction and a lot of
other use also comes into play.  So we are using 250,000 of water washed
sand and gravel in addition to the crushed rock aggregate that actually is
produced locally.

So in a real free market, the local sands would end up being used.  As
stands, current producers have a capital investment i keeping their current
deposits operational and NIMBY ideas about not wanting a 'mine' in ones
sight assist them in what is a very unsound environmental practice that gets
dressed up as 'green' policy.

The way to get past that is to start to move to green acounting pronciples
on business and governmental regulatory rewuirements.  Air, water and fuel
are not free, nor is land or any other environmental good.  We need to value
them all properly so that true costs are reflected and a free market can
then operate.

Phil Nisbet


>From: Tbertruss at aol.com
>To: bbradber at moscow.com
>CC: london at moscow.com, pcnisbet1 at hotmail.com, vision2020 at moscow.com
>Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Building and development planning
>Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2005 14:54:32 EDT
>
>
>Brad et. al.
>
>Thanks for the link to the article about how Willits, California is
>addressing the energy crisis (and other associated issues), which I think
>should not be
>viewed as something that will happen in the future, but is happening right
>now.
>
>Vision2020 gets numerous complaints about content, but often there are
>critical issues that are addressed on this list that garner scant
>attention.  Sorry
>I missed your previous post on this issue where you first presented this
>link.
>
>http://www.metroactive.com/papers/sonoma/08.10.05/willits-0532.html
>
>Some may think depletion of fossil fuels is not a "local" issue, but if any
>issue is both local and global at once, it is this one!  Unless you are
>living
>in a culture unplugged from the critical need for fossil fuels.
>
>I wonder when the hoarding of gas, bought at what will be assumed to be
>lower
>prices and easier availability, will start to become more common?
>
>We can debate when this will happen, but that it will happen is not
>debatable!  Well, that is, unless the USA starts a "Manhattan Project" type
>of effort
>to both save existing fossil fuel resources as much as possible, and then
>start
>transitioning aggressively to other energy sources and technology.  People
>can point to the development of new energy sources and more efficient
>technology, but the facts are that the US and global consumption of fossil
>fuels, in a
>pattern that creates continuing dependence on these fossil fuels for
>economic
>viability, continues to increase.
>
>When we see an actual leveling or a reduction in fossil fuel consumption,
>then we will know the problem is really being addressed!
>
>The free market conservatives who think the marketplace will solve these
>problems are ignoring that the marketplace does not focus on the costs of
>business
>as usual (continuing squandering of fossil fuels) fifty years in the future
>(or whenever the fossil fuel crisis hits hard) in the quarterly reports
>given
>to stockholders, when we will see the impact of the lack of sufficient
>planning
>now occurring for the end of the age of cheap oil.
>
>Ted Moffett

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