Impact of carbon tax on electricity prices

Andrew Bolt has put up a table showing the CO2 emissions of our largest companies, as well as how much carbon tax they'd have to pay.

Top of the list is Macquarie Generation, a state owned generator in the Hunter Valley with a couple of coal fired plants. According to Bolt, with a tax of $26 a tonne, Macquarie will have to pay $613 million in carbon taxes.

In 2010, Macquarie had total revenue of $1,157 million. Take away expenses and taxes etc, and profit ended up being $196 million.

I have seen some rather deranged comments by leftoids saying that it would be eeeeevil if companies put their prices up and "gouged" consumers.

Hmm. They make a profit of $196 million, but then get slugged with an extra $613 million in costs - and it's eeeevil of them to put their prices up?

I think not.

Still, what we do now is that in order for Macquarie to continue making a reasonable profit (it has to make a profit as it owes $800 million, and that has to be paid back out of profits), it's going to have to increase its revenue by just over 50%. Which of course will feed straight into our power bills.

Now you can argue that the purpose of the carbon tax is to force a company like Macquarie to give up coal and go renewable. However, that ignores the fact that they'll have to write off $3.4 billion worth of power stations, whilst paying off $800 million of debt. That hit of course will have to be taken by the NSW taxpayer, either through higher taxes or higher power bills. Either way, we're fucked.

Sob story

Read one of the usual sob stories in the paper this morning (can't find a link) - a charity was moaning that poor families were coming to it for assistance with power bills of thousands of dollars, and it couldn't offer them more than $30 etc etc.

We're a family of 5 in an old house that is woeful when it comes to thermal efficiency. We have the usual slew of appliances and gadgets, yet our last power bill was $350. Our worst ever (over winter) just tipped over $1,000 - and that was a big shock (no pun intended).

I just don't get how a family that is supposedly poor in the first place can run up huge power bills. If you're poor, how do you afford all those appliances that chew up all that power? Are they complaining that they can't pay a $1,000 power bill just a few months after buying a $2,500 plasma TV? Or after installing air conditioning?

Here's the thing - if you're poor, life is probably going to be uncomfortable. That is part and parcel of being poor. You'll have to do without a few things, like having a huge TV and running an air conditioner 24x7. You'll have to put an extra jumper on in winter. If you want to be more comfortable, then you need to go out and earn more money (or get a job in the first place). That means working harder, moving to a place with better jobs or getting skilled up.

We had to make a lot of changes to get our power bill down to $350 (and they didn't involve ripping the taxpayers off by installing solar panels). They were simple things like hanging washing out to dry instead of being lazy and using the dryer, using the air conditioner only when it's really bloody hot and laying off the heater when it's cool. We've sacrificed a bit of ease and comfort for a smaller power bill. If we can do that, I don't see why we should have to cough up to cover the power bills of those that are too lazy or too stupid to do the same. They won't learn a bloody thing if we keep giving them handouts every time they stuff their life up. All they'll learn is that they can do incredibly silly things, and the state will always bail them out.

Sort of like the Queensland government.....