I started thinking about this entry ages ago when I had an epiphany and I felt that it could be proven that a speed/price/throughput advantage would exist for "fibre" over "wireless". (Conversely, a flexibility and ability to function when the grid is "down", advantage would always exist the other way).
The basis of the proof is basically that any imaginable technology that improves speed over wireless electromagnetic radiation, would be applicable to wired electromagnetic radiation in the same proportion of improvement.
In the case of broadband, at one extreme is Fibre to the Home and the other extreme is Satellite broadband. Wi-Fi is closer to the FTTH side, then there is 3G style wireless broadband that relies on the mobile network which is connected via mainly fibre, and satellite, which can work even if the whole countries internet is down, theoretically. This doesn't really prove that FTTH is worth pursuing, because it is a tenable argument (although I would dispute it) that wireless will improve to the point that it is fast and cheap enough for everything we find important.
Back in Uni, it was proposed that solid state storage improvements were happening faster than hard drive improvements and could overtake them, and although a USB stick is enough for most things, portable hard drives still hold more and are used a lot, the storage advantage of hard drives is constant, due to the solid state improvements being equally applicable to hard drive storage.
Similar grid vs grid independent comparisons are common - road vs helicopter, grid power vs home generators, rail vs aeroplane, piped gas vs cylinders, water tanks vs dam & pipes, private dam storages vs large scale dams for irrigation.
With this in mind, simple goal based arithmetic could decide the balance between grid based and grid independent systems.
For Photo Voltaic electricity generation, I think we have got it backwards, which is why grid parity is not served well with thousands (or millions) of individual installations. If a household is after energy independence, a PV system with a significant amount of battery storage (batteries suitable for an electric car?) is actually very useful and would be a boon for extended power outages (like after Yasi). Because home PV installations are optimised to feed power back into the grid, they are quite useless as independent power sources, compared to diesel generators.
However, if we want PV power to compete with Coal or Gas, we need economies of scale of large scale PV based power stations.
Showing posts with label privatisation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label privatisation. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Friday, June 05, 2009
Funding of Universities
Chris Fellows writes in the Australian:
I KEEP reading reports ("UNE legal bill rises to $1.3 million", HES online, May 29) that the University of New England receives a larger proportion of its income from the federal Government than any other Australian university as if this were a bad thing.
A public university should be accountable to the public and align its activities with the public interest. This is most likely to happen if it is funded by the citizens of Australia through our federal Government because he who pays the piper calls the tune. Every week I read in the HES stories about universities in trouble because their investments have tanked, or overseas student numbers have dropped, or a sweet deal with industry has led to a conflict of interest.
It would not be in the national interest if the federal Government provided 50 per cent of the navy's funding and forced it to obtain the rest by offering cruises and hiring ships out to foreign countries. Equally, it is not in Australia's interest to make public tertiary education - a critical part of our national infrastructure - dependent on narrow sectors of the community, or overseas customers, whose goals may not align with those of the nation.
Marconomically speaking, of course, I disagree with the specifics of the assertion, that universities are better for the country if they are run by the public purse, while at the same time agreeing with the gist that "Infrastructure" should be publicly funded.
The question is, which aspects of a university are "infrastructure" (Long term investments which benefits a lot of people, with no easy way to charge the people that benefit), and which aspects are products and service that people need and/or desire at an individual level, are willing to pay for, and private enterprises can make money from it by providing it the best way?
The infrastructure aspect of a University (Buildings, utilities, roads, long term equipment, general research projects etc.) ought to be funded publicly, and the Product/service aspects( gaining qualifications suitable for employment, industry specific research and development etc.) ought to be funded privately.
The private enterprises ought to be charged a rental and or tax for the infrastructure aspects which they use to sell the products or services which they charge for.
This issue screams that Universities should split off private arms, and look at divesting the aspects that are better handled by private enterprise.
I KEEP reading reports ("UNE legal bill rises to $1.3 million", HES online, May 29) that the University of New England receives a larger proportion of its income from the federal Government than any other Australian university as if this were a bad thing.
A public university should be accountable to the public and align its activities with the public interest. This is most likely to happen if it is funded by the citizens of Australia through our federal Government because he who pays the piper calls the tune. Every week I read in the HES stories about universities in trouble because their investments have tanked, or overseas student numbers have dropped, or a sweet deal with industry has led to a conflict of interest.
It would not be in the national interest if the federal Government provided 50 per cent of the navy's funding and forced it to obtain the rest by offering cruises and hiring ships out to foreign countries. Equally, it is not in Australia's interest to make public tertiary education - a critical part of our national infrastructure - dependent on narrow sectors of the community, or overseas customers, whose goals may not align with those of the nation.
Marconomically speaking, of course, I disagree with the specifics of the assertion, that universities are better for the country if they are run by the public purse, while at the same time agreeing with the gist that "Infrastructure" should be publicly funded.
The question is, which aspects of a university are "infrastructure" (Long term investments which benefits a lot of people, with no easy way to charge the people that benefit), and which aspects are products and service that people need and/or desire at an individual level, are willing to pay for, and private enterprises can make money from it by providing it the best way?
The infrastructure aspect of a University (Buildings, utilities, roads, long term equipment, general research projects etc.) ought to be funded publicly, and the Product/service aspects( gaining qualifications suitable for employment, industry specific research and development etc.) ought to be funded privately.
The private enterprises ought to be charged a rental and or tax for the infrastructure aspects which they use to sell the products or services which they charge for.
This issue screams that Universities should split off private arms, and look at divesting the aspects that are better handled by private enterprise.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Education - Nationalise or privatise?
My simple rule of thumb is: that for the longer the term of the investment (before being profitable), the further it should be towards nationalisation on the continuum. Pre-school children are basically a very long term investment before what they have learnt makes an impact on society. University students, however, in a few short years, can go from being smart to being an asset to an employer, society or whatever. Therefore, the efficiency of competitive private finance is critical for universities, but almost meaningless for kindergarten. This is why I think "The Economist" is correct when it states that governments should deregulate and privatise higher education.
Friday, June 08, 2007
Stuff That should remain nationalised
As in ownership and control.
Lawmaking - The Government is that which makes the laws about stuff.
Law enforcement - Enforce the laws that one makes.
Judiciary - Make judgements about the laws one makes.
Infrastructure - These sort of investments are of such a long term nature, very hard to structure into a market, are natural monopolies, have risks which are hard to insure for, have little advantage of competition, and competition can cause unnecessary duplication of infrastructure and waste. eg Roads, Rail, fibre-optic networks, power networks, airports.
Fallback basic primary school education - Government owned and controlled schools can compete on an even keel with private schools at a primary school level.
Fallback basic universal health care - including emergency, preventative and educational. "elective" stuff should be private.
Pensions - same reasons as for infrastructure. Highly regulated private superannuation system as in Australia is great too.
Disaster recovery - As opposed to insurance, there is no reason why any private interest would have a spare reserve trained specialists for immediate help. The Australian army seems much better for instance.
National Security - Command and control is necessary to at least protect the functions of government.
Lawmaking - The Government is that which makes the laws about stuff.
Law enforcement - Enforce the laws that one makes.
Judiciary - Make judgements about the laws one makes.
Infrastructure - These sort of investments are of such a long term nature, very hard to structure into a market, are natural monopolies, have risks which are hard to insure for, have little advantage of competition, and competition can cause unnecessary duplication of infrastructure and waste. eg Roads, Rail, fibre-optic networks, power networks, airports.
Fallback basic primary school education - Government owned and controlled schools can compete on an even keel with private schools at a primary school level.
Fallback basic universal health care - including emergency, preventative and educational. "elective" stuff should be private.
Pensions - same reasons as for infrastructure. Highly regulated private superannuation system as in Australia is great too.
Disaster recovery - As opposed to insurance, there is no reason why any private interest would have a spare reserve trained specialists for immediate help. The Australian army seems much better for instance.
National Security - Command and control is necessary to at least protect the functions of government.
Privatisation/Nationalisation Axioms
* - Continuous Spectrum. For any "Stuff" there is a continuum of policy of ownership from Government-owned monopoly all the way to unregulated competitive private ownership. Some markers being Highly regulated private monopoly, Government owned but some private subcontracting, majority owned near-monopoly competing with private enterprises, Government services competing in a fairly level field with private. Conveniently economists can come to a consensensus on where on the spectrum a policy puts itself.
* - Independent nation-states able to individually pursue and experiment with policies without being able to impose such policy on other countries or be imposed on from the UN or other supranational entity.
* - The judgement on policy is essentially which country does well in a typical competitive environment in the ideal where the policy concerned is the only point of difference.
* - There is little or no interdependence between different "stuff" being privatised. ie. if A is privatised, and B is privatised, the net effect will be approximately the sum of the effects of each.
* - Price controls on "Stuff" which is nominally privatised has the effect of removing a large chunk of control from private interests and should be considered in the nationalisation end of the spectrum.
* - Independent nation-states able to individually pursue and experiment with policies without being able to impose such policy on other countries or be imposed on from the UN or other supranational entity.
* - The judgement on policy is essentially which country does well in a typical competitive environment in the ideal where the policy concerned is the only point of difference.
* - There is little or no interdependence between different "stuff" being privatised. ie. if A is privatised, and B is privatised, the net effect will be approximately the sum of the effects of each.
* - Price controls on "Stuff" which is nominally privatised has the effect of removing a large chunk of control from private interests and should be considered in the nationalisation end of the spectrum.
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