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Question by Astro Smurf: Would high speed rail and alternative energy funding be a wise investment with increasing oil prices?

Best answer:

Answer by Dr.T
No. Drill, baby, drill.

Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!

Question by I want to plow your wife: What is one alternative energy technology that you would like to see become more widespread?
I know we have a lot of alternative energy skeptics in here, but the reality is that point-source energy production using a wide array of energy technologies will be the way of the future. Large scale wind and solar operations are technological nightmares and cost-wise gigantic monstrosities, but wide-spread adoption of small scale usage by individual homeowners has gigantic potential. Also, methane re-uptake technologies for commercial farming operations and water treatment facilities are also likely to become significant contributors to our future energy basket.

What is one alternative energy technology that you would take a serious interest in if it were more cost effective. Also, if you invested in some kind of alternative energy technology, how long of a payback period (recouping of costs through savings on utility bills) do you consider to be reasonable? For the sake of this question let’s assume the unit you purchase will have a 30 year useful lifespan and your total return on investment would be 30/x, where x is your payback period, suggesting an average payback period of six years would imply a 500% total return on investment.

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Announcing the Democrats’ bold new “plan” on energy last week, Pelosi said breaking into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve “is one alternative.” That’s not an energy plan. It’s using what we already have — much like “conservation,” which is also part of the Democrats’ plan.

Conservation, efficiency and using oil we hold in reserve for emergencies does not get us more energy. It’s as if we were running out of food and the Democrats were telling us: “Just eat a little less every day.” Great! We’ll die a little more slowly. That’s not what we call a “plan.” We need more energy, not a plan for a slower death.

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Big trucks and SUVs are expected to out sell cars and hybrids! Just because gas prices have dropped AGAIN!? How dumb can people be? This happens every few years, the oil Co.s Rape Americans at the gas pumps and then we all start screaming for electric cars. Then, as soon as the Big 3 start to make the cars we need to clean up the air and reduce our need for Mid east oil (#1 source of funding for the terrorists who want to kill us) Americans forget the $4.50 per gal. gas and the big three scrap the high millage car production we begged them to start.Then in a year or so we are back up to $4a gal gas, only next time it will be $7-$9 per Gal.! President Obama Promised “I will not forget just because the oil co.s drop prices again, I will push for Green vehicles”. When will Americans learn from their history? even if it was just a few months ago?

http://mutual-funds.us/2008/12/22/autos/trucks_back/index.htm

My list:

1. Marijuana should be legal. Instead of housing thousands of inmates in jails and spending taxpayer money on their upkeep, we should tax and regulate its sale. We should mandate laws around high driving and make those DUI penalties really steep, to keep the public safe from… well – public.

2. We should have capital punishment for the most vicious, vial type of sexual offenders and murderers. Especially, murders for money. There should be defining limits to this, let’s say if it is just manslaughter, then the person should be put in jail, but those with reckless disregard for human life should not be spared. Eye for an eye. We should make prisoners work hard – let them build buildings, dig canals, whatever, as long as they stay productive.

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A new global fund that invests in the world’s top clean-energy companies is to be launched in Canada today by Criterion Investments Ltd., which sees huge opportunity in efforts to “de-carbonize” the environment.
Ian McPherson, president of Criterion, an affiliate of VenGrowth Asset Management Inc. of Toronto, said clean energy has matured beyond being a niche sector that until recently could only be tapped by seeking out and placing bets on individual companies.
“The sector has matured; it’s no longer nascent,” said McPherson. “You have very strong capital flows and now there’s some investment management talent in the area, whereas historically there’s been a real shortage.”
The timing is right to launch a managed fund, he said. “It’s on people’s radar screens. Clean energy has more mainstream acceptance.”
The company is billing the RRSP-eligible Criterion Global Clean Energy Fund as the first Canadian fund of its kind focused on the clean-energy theme. Geneva-based Pictet Asset Management SA is investment adviser for the “high-risk” fund, which the Swiss company launched in May and is currently available throughout Europe and parts of Asia.
Phillipe de Weck, senior fund manager from Pictet, said in a phone interview from Geneva that concern over climate change and a worldwide drive to reduce greenhouse gases, backed by ambitious government targets and incentives, has primed the sector for long-term growth.
“We believe it will outperform the economy as a whole,” he said, pointing out that the fund has jumped 7 per cent in its first four months compared to a drop of 2 per cent on the MSCI World Index, which measures the performance of market indices in 23 developed countries.
“We’re at the phase where policymakers have set targets, and now they have to move to the next stage where regulations are needed to move to those targets,” he added. “We want to take advantage of that, and we think it’s a long-term trend. The transition to clean energy is a trend that will last our lifetime.”
The fund was most recently invested in 59 companies, about 40 per cent located in the United States. Top 10 holdings included wind giants Gamesa and Vestas, and solar suppliers Suntech Power and Q-Cells.
Three Canadian companies are currently in the fund: hydropower developer Plutonic Power of Vancouver; wind and hydro developer Canadian Hydro Developers Inc. of Calgary; and Westport Innovations Inc., a developer of natural gas and hydrogen combustion engines in Vancouver.
De Weck said natural gas fits within the theme because it’s an important “transition fuel” to clean energy, though the fund doesn’t invest in nuclear power technologies or providers.
“The safety and waste issues are still unresolved,” he said. “Yes, there are plans for more nuclear, but let’s be realistic. We’ve been in a nuclear winter in terms of skills and expertise. We haven’t had that brain influx in the field and we simply don’t have the experience.”
Nicholas Parker, co-founder and chairman of the Cleantech Group, a provider of research and investor services targeted at the clean technology sector, predicted the Criterion fund would be received well in Canada.
“Canadian retail and institutional investors have been underserved in this space relative to their European and American counterparts, so I think this is going to meet demand,” he said.
Parker’s group launched a Cleantech Index in partnership with the American Stock Exchange last year that tracks more than 70 publicly traded U.S. companies in the sector. He said his main concern is that the Criterion fund is focused on clean energy and excludes technologies aimed at cleaning up water and soil, reducing waste and creating “green” materials.
Limiting the fund to just energy makes it more volatile, he argued. “Which is why we’re advocating the broader cleantech space.”
Last October, PowerShares Capital Management LLC launched an exchange-traded fund (ETF) based on the Cleantech Index.
Like most ETFs, the fees are more affordable than managed funds – for example, 0.7 per cent for the PowerShares fund compared to between 2.65 per cent and 2.75 per cent for the Criterion fund, which is near average for the mutual fund industry.
McPherson said the Criterion fund adds value by being actively managed. “Our portfolio manager will be trading to take a view on valuation, whereas those ETFs are a static portfolio for certain periods of time and don’t take into account if something is undervalued or overvalued as an index.”
So far, however, the passively managed PowerShares fund, while traded in U.S. dollars and vulnerable to foreign exchange exposure, is performing well – it’s up more than 20 per cent since its launch 11 months ago.
Since mid-May, when the Pictet fund was launched in Europe, the PowerShares fund has increased nearly 9 per cent.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/19/technology/19cows.html?_r=1

I would be, but I am not vegan nor vegetarian, I grew up around dairy farms of PA and farmers do not treat the cows meanly, they are too expensive and too much of an investment, plus the dairy farmers are kind people who are also mostly strict Christians, Amish and Mennonite and even if they believe animals are property, they are good stewards of all thier property, stewardship is is deeply ingrained in the Pa Dutch so they make everything last as long as possible and get the most use out of it as possible, thus we will eat things like pig’s feet and beef tongue that average people throw away, so I do not believe all dairy farmers are cruel monsters, though maybe some in other areas are.
So anyway would any vegans ever consider using the animal waste as an energy source or will this be considered inhumane as well.
I should have put this in environment but I really wanted the vegans view, not interested in fighting, just curious is all if this technology would be recieved or rejected by vegans.

This alternative should have a lot of advantages compared to the other alternatives. It should also prove that it is going to be a good national investment. please, help. thank you.

Matt Taibi—Rolling Stone magazine:

“The bank owns a 10 percent stake in the Chicago Climate Exchange, where the carbon credits will be traded. Moreover, Goldman owns a minority stake in Blue Source LLC, a Utah-based firm that sells carbon credits of the type that will be in great demand if the bill passes. Nobel Prize winner Al Gore, who is intimately involved with the planning of cap-and-trade, started up a company called Generation Investment Management with three former bigwigs from Goldman Sachs Asset Management, David Blood, Mark Ferguson and Peter Harris. Their business? Investing in carbon offsets. There’s also a $500 million Green Growth Fund set up by a Goldmanite to invest in green-tech … the list goes on and on. Goldman is ahead of the headlines again, just waiting for someone to make it rain in the right spot.”