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Comment by pdabbadabba | Hacker News Reader

> in 20 years when the patent expires...

Well, only if the patent-holder makes no effort to maximize the return on its investment in those 20 years. But if the technology is really that effective and the patent-holder is even a little bit economically rational, then presumably the patent holder will be the one pushing hardest to make this the standard thing to do with recovered CO2 well before the patent expires.

Not that patents are all roses and puppy dogs. But this is too big a part of the picture to just ignore.

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The patent-holder has licensed the technology to company with a large sunk cost in handling petroleum from the ground. I suppose SHV Energy could decide to put up a solar farm driving CO2 -> C3H8 catalysis, but where's the money in it for them? I would like to be happily surprised, but my guess is it's some form of green-washing.

That’s backwards is it not?

A fossil fuels company has deep incentive to minimize the harm of fossil fuels. A solar company has incentives to make fossil fuels as bad as they can.

Even if you generally perceive fossil fuels guys as bad guys.

Regardless. Any company has incentives to do this if someone (government) will pay for it. It doesn’t really harm any profits.

> A fossil fuels company has deep incentive to minimize the harm of fossil fuels.

They have a deep incentive to capture the regulatory framework that might hold them accountable for that harm, which they have accomplished.

Yes, the sentiment is so completely ignorant of what they have actually done during the last four decades that I'm now on like the third or fourth take...

Right, and the ones who are best able to figure out regulations are, of course, the businesses themselves!!

Look how well that's worked out for the financial sector. Nothing but good faith actors there. Immaculate.

I’m not saying fossil fuels companies should be in charge of regulating fossil fuels companies.

I’m saying that fossil fuels companies are incentivized to sell useful co2 converters because this enables them to sell more fossil fuels.

> A fossil fuels company has deep incentive to minimize the harm of fossil fuels

You... you're aware that the actual, historically realized, attitude of fossil fuel companies has been to deny any harm exists, right? Deny it to the tune of 200 million dollars as recently of 2019, and for good reason! That spending bought them lots of political inaction since the science was settled in like 1990, you know: the days where keeping staying below 1.0 degrees warming was a realistic goal.

what is historical fact compared to what my imagination tells me should have happened?

I am aware of that, yes. This doesn’t change the calculus of today.

CO2 conversion tech is a path to selling more fossil fuels.

Why spend on tech that might not be a sure thing when bribery has been working for decades?

Because that’s a gross oversimplification of things that sounds punchy but isn’t particularly realistic.

Okay explain for us the realistic mechanism by which CO2 conversion technology allows oil companies to not only sell more fossil fuels than they do now, but most importantly does so with a greater ROI than the open bribery that our institutions not only allow for but actually require to function.

Because it sounds to me, speaking of "punchy but not particularly realistic" that you have some idea in your head of how our politics and economics work, that is contrary to even a cursory examination of material reality, and is laughably naive. And I earnestly want to hear it, because I could use a laugh today.

> Because it sounds to me, speaking of "punchy but not particularly realistic" that you have some idea in your head of how our politics and economics work, that is contrary to even a cursory examination of material reality, and is laughably naive. And I earnestly want to hear it, because I could use a laugh today.

Could you please not.

You are presenting a false dichotomy. It’s not “bribe vs. use this tech”. It’s also not really about bribing at all. Fossil fuels are important. That sucks, but we do need them in the short term.

If this tech works, and the government is willing to pay for it to some extent, it’s probably a lot cheaper to build caseload gas plants and peak daytime load renewables than it is to try and build excessive green power and batteries to tide the night over.

Or just, you know, worst case run this profitable service independently of externalities

Or you could just sell more fossil fuels.

Why? Why not just sell more fossil fuels?

No they've decided to go the route of tobacco companies, deny everything and party while the sun is shining. By the time the lawyers show up they're counting on being dead or too old to stand trial.

Carbon credits. Tesla was only viable in the early years all due to carbon credit purchases.

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