Fossil Energy Non-Proliferation Groups

Allies to the biosphere.

These groups seek to stop the proliferation of coal and gas burning power plants and to shut down the plants that currently exist. This makes them and the people who join them a great ally to the biosphere and the unusual but delicate conditions that support life on this planet.

These non-proliferation group make agreements with regions and countries that stop them from building these plants and give them incentives to use alternative sources of energy, such as wind or solar or even tidal energy. These groups may guarantee debt or subsidize the cost of the solar investments or deliver other terms that make solar or wind energy infrastructure investments more appealing than those for coal or gas.

Such incentives are often necessary because many benefits of wind and solar go to parties other than the energy producer (just as many costs of coal and gas power plants—such as pollution or ocean acidification or weather distortion—fall on the shoulders of people not involved with the company) and the energy producers are structurally incapable of  accounting for these benefits or accepting an event short term reduction in profitability—or increase in debt—that might result from solar or wind investments.

Because many developing countries are now developing an energy infrastructure and because coal is often readily available in these areas, these non-proliferation groups and agreements are necessary in order to reduce global CO2 emissions and reduce the existential threat posed by catastrophic climate destabilization.

There are also market distortions and pricing failures that make coal and the burning of coal less costly for producers. So the burning of coal is subsidized (implicitly and explicitly) by many governments, laws and policies. Non-proliferation groups are important in the effort to make these distortions and subsidies more widely recognized and to propose reforms. One reform might be for governments to refuse new permits for coal mining operations.

Fossil energy non-proliferation groups push policies and agreements that defend existing ecosystems and deliver energy sources that free people from the current moral predicament of needing energy for daily use but not wishing to contribute to the destruction of the biosphere.