I agree... but it all depend on the situation. For example, existing power grid, including conventional power plant can take 20% or 30% of intermittent power with close to no extra cost... And the energy mix, the interconnections, the location, the consumption habits all have an impact on the price. Simulation at a grid level, including demand response, thermal storage... can give some precise ideas.
Note that for doing apple to apple we should also include positive and negative externalities
Security wise, a much more decentralize system have some big advantages...
Yes managing intermittence have a cost, but battery is not the only solution out there.
A good diversified / complementary mix of source of energy reduce the level of the intermittence. Aside of thermal powerplant, some hydropower and biomass can be very flexible for example.
Solar and wind are so cheap now, that it make sense to build more than we need at peak, giving some extra buffer.
You can work on the demand side of electricity. Lowering the peak or making demand more flexible for example.
On the electricity storage, stationary batteries make sometime sense... EV can also play a role. There are also other solution like pumped hydro.
And thermal storage have a huge potential - and it is relatively cheap
Even if I am the owner of an apartment, I don't have the right to do a metal concert in my living room some Saturdays at 1 am... or don't have the right to paint my frontage the way I want... cause it creates negative consequences for other people.
Having vacant apartments and houses for long time in places where there is an housing shortage create much bigger negative consequences than few metal concerts...
You do have a right to do a metal concert in your living room on Saturday at 1AM. You don’t have a right to violate the local noise ordinance or, because your example has you as an apartment owner and not a building owner, the condo association rules.
You do have the right to paint your frontage the way you want with respect to the GOVERNMENT.
But more importantly, the GP wanted the government to TAKE VIA FORFEITURE any building that is merely vacant. Your examples are limits on use, not relinquishment of property. They are not the same.
There isn't a government on the planet which doesn't place limits on how you can paint your property. Try painting a death threat against a government official on it for example.
The notion that property rights is unlimited is an extremist view that doesn't match the legal situation in any jurisdiction on the planet with a government.
I am volunteering in an housing rights organization in France, and I am and have been tenant in a city with high price and housing shortage.
There will always be many people taking "illegal deal" as sometime you have no other other solution, or other solution are even worse. And many many landlords are doing illegal things, including public housing.
Tenant don't have the same bargaining power / freedom / agency than landlord. Fighting illegal stuff that do landlord is long (usually longer than kicking out a squatter) and difficult. And you have little incentive to do it as a tenant : being in a fight with your landlord = being sure to have problem down the line
My feeling is that your comment ignores this asymmetry.
"My feeling is that your comment ignores this asymmetry."
These are enforcement problems, not squatter problems. As you've said, the things the landlords are doing are already illegal. In the US we have Attorney General offices that will handle housing cases on behalf of tenants.
Both parties can benefit from better enforcement and written and recorded leases. Penalties for landlords leasing without recorded agreements may be more easily enforced that under the current system.
This asymmetry makes enforcement easier when it profits the landlord, and make enforcement more difficult when it benefits the tenant... Your reflection seems based on the idea that there is a symmetry on the enforcement
1) If it is where you lived they always could be (and were) kicked out quickly (and it was not that simple in other situations)
2) Now the law changed and it is much easier and faster to kick them out. It was always illegal to squat, now sanction are higher
3) Most squatters are not targeting houses. And all the time squats are mainly building not used for years (as it safer and easier for squatters, and sometimes as a way to "minimize" disturbances)
Please note that in Holland some kind of squat were legals for years (only for building not used for years and with obligation to not damage the property and to give it back quickly). Seems interesting to me
We have a lot of existing stuff ("political stuff" like cabron pricing, or "technological" stuff like double glazing or heat pump) that already make sense economically that we don't use fully. How AI deeply impact it ?
1) there are still trillions of "subsidies" (that includes some negative externalities)to fossil fuel each year according to IMF (IMF, not Greenpeace!).
2) Agents in the current system have incentives to prioritize short term benefits over longer term benefits. And a lot of climate related things are short term cost/investment for "profitable" long term benefits ; the current system sucks big time in this configuration.
3) The people having the least negative impact from climate change are the countries emitting the most greenhouse gas. The countries the more negatively impacted by climate change are countries contributing the least to climate change. There is a big misalignment of interest there making a purely "free market" "economical" solution difficult.
4) There are a lot of case in the real world were there is a strong economical incentive to switch to something different and were the different agents just don't... Because people don't want to change, because there can be some particular interest in the system, because of political motive... Human is not a rational animal, and his rationality is not only dictated by money
5) We need to do more than just switching from fossil to "green electricity"
Positive discrimination can see as racist, ok. (even if positive discrimination being here because of negative (generally unconscious) discrimination and because "diversity" is generally good for innovation and competitiveness).
But what here is " DEEPLY racist against white people" ?
A company decides it doesn't want to hire black people or Hispanic people. They decide they only want to hire whites and Asians. Any of their employees who do not meet the quotas and hire too many blacks lose bonuses or are outright fired.
Would you still ask what is deeply racist in that case?
If you have to completely ignore the historical and present status of racial discrimination in order to make your argument, it's not quite as effective as you might think it is.
Do you agree the important negative (often unconscious, based on cognitive bias) discrimination against minorities is a problem for the country competitiveness ? (negatively discriminated despite "merit")
Do you agree that reducing racial gap and gender gap in USA would be better for the country and its competitiveness ?
I am not a fan of quota, especially taken in isolation... But the underlying issued are huge, for a moral (not everybody have the same moral) but also economic standpoint
Note that for doing apple to apple we should also include positive and negative externalities