Enough Already

May 31

Enough already with my seemingly open complaints about government not doing (barely) anything to spur the growth of alternative energy and energy saving measures that we need here in the U.S.

As I was thinking of ways for government to strongly encourage private, corporate entities, and individuals to do the right things on their own, I started thinking tax incentives. Since there are so many tax deductions for big business and the rich, why not for the regular guy/gal?

Then today as I was pouring over the Financial Times; in the Thursday edition I spotted an article with the header: Solar energy investor presses for extension of US tax credit
In summary, a leading US private equity group last November said it would team up with Lockheed Martin, the defense company, to develop solar energy fields in the southern U.S. They figure the solar market could be worth $30bn in 10 years but the deal hinges on the extension of a 30 percent tax credit for solar investments.

Again, why can't our government take lessons from Germany who has been doing so since the middle of the 1990's? Why can't it be a semi permanent part of the taxation policy until our country is well entrenched in solar and other alternative energy solutions? This week, Germany announced it would peel back a small percentage of incentives. Far from eliminating or severely curtailing the incentives. Why is it so hard to do the very same thing here? Is it the overly generous salaries and pensions paid to our government leaders? Is it some ridiculous program that we are funding? Is it just the war and the billions/trillion we are wasting in the name of "national security" over-seas because a handful of men and a woman have some sort of twisted plan to play out?

Why is it we don't offer complete tax deductions for putting energy saving light bulbs in our homes, meaningful deductions for going to hybrid vehicles over our 100lbs. per week carbon producing gasoline powered vehicles. Why should property owners pay higher taxes for erecting wind energy mills on their property and feeding electric back onto the power grid? It seems in this last example that the savings are reduced greatly through additional taxes. Where is the logic in that???

Enough already...