Researchers call fossil fuel subsidies the worst energy policy - Mongabay

--> Energy policy experts Paasha Mahdavi and Michael Ross criticized government subsidies for fossil fuel consumers introduced in response to rising energy prices in an editorial for the journal Science. As Mongabay reports , the authors called this practice the worst energy policy in the world.

Mahdavi, an associate professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Ross, a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, note that subsidies make it possible to keep fuel prices low for consumers. Governments cover the price difference through taxes, borrowing or cuts to other spending.

According to the editorial’s authors, this policy drains public budgets, worsens air pollution, discourages investment in renewable energy and is difficult to abolish once introduced. They explain this in part by the fact that consumers are particularly sensitive to changes in gasoline prices, which they regularly see at gas stations.