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wateroverfire posted:*Axes Hydro Aysen. Declares victory for SOCIAL JUSTICE. Pays highest rates for energy in Latin America and wonders why poo poo is so expensive to make here* Yeah, what is she planning on doing to deal with the energy crisis? I sort of understand why HydroAysen was axed, given that it was widely perceived as being the pet big business project of a big business (and exceedingly unpopular) president, as well as having severe (and more importantly, very readily apparent) environmental consequences. But what are the alternatives currently on the table? A little background into why this is an issue: quote:"In the Chilean power generation industry, approximately 65% of the electricity output is based on fossil fuels. Renewable sources such as hydroelectricity (34%), solar and wind (1%) are the only ones that can be considered domestic. Chile imports virtually 100% of the raw fossil fuels it requires to power the country. In 2011, of total imports of $70 billion, Chile spent $14 billion in fossil fuels such as crude, gas and coal. With almost no domestic fossil fuels extraction, Chile is highly exposed to both international prices’ volatility and trade agreements with supplying countries. It is understandable that Chile fears this dependency after the so-called Argentinean gas crisis. During the 90’s Chile entered into natural gas long-term purchase agreements with Argentina and consequently based its power generation matrix on the presumed long-term availability and accessibility to Argentinean gas. Numerous pipelines and gas-fired power generation units were constructed and operated for several years until the Argentinean government, starting in 2002, Source: https://faculty.fuqua.duke.edu/~charvey/Teaching/663_2014/Treeni/Hidroaysen_case.pdf (it's a homework assignment for an american business school, but it contains all the relevant data) From what I understand, the alternatives are dealing with Argentina again or trying to get cheap gas from Bolivia, but the Argentinian government is famously unreliable (not to mention currently saddled with hedge fund debt) and the latter will probably want to enforce their maritime demands before any deal can be discussed. To me this seems like an interesting problem because if whatever solution they come up with can be generalized, other small countries lacking the capital or right conditions to go nuclear, or the geopolitical power to "liberate" oil-rich countries, might learn a lot from it. As for Bachelet wanting to tax the decadently rich chilean upper crust, boo-loving-hoo. With a GINI that ranks 15 world-wide, there shouldn't even be a discussion about its necessity.
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Aug 18, 2014 21:40
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| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 01:26 |
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