If we relied entirely on government, we'd have no electricity whatsoever. You should know this. Your own country has heavily intervened in markets for decades, while ours has not. Look at the average income and living standards of a Romanian citizen and an American. Vastly different.

Remember the thread where we discussed food? I pay the same amount for most any type of food you do - flour, rice, beef, chicken, potatoes, but the average person makes 3 times as much money in my country as yours. Likewise, for energy, I pay about 33% less per killowatt hour as you do (about 11 cents per KWH vs. 15 cents per KWH based on the current exchange rate). That is why free markets can work very well. If you let them work over a long period of time, people become more productive, do more things, and items become cheaper. Likewise, when you restrict and prevent people from engaging in activities at their own will, then less production occurs.

Why?

Yeah.  Keep getting errors trying to translate it.

Also there is this

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125193815050081615.html

200 million a year in subsidies.

until 2008 at 1 billion.

With no actual mention of how much this solar power costs outside of JUST subsidies.

For example how much the average consumer pays vs oil/coal/even wind.  Or how much they pay over those if you removed the price jacking on other energy to make solar attractive.

Saphi, you had to know you were going to get replys from this comment.

The Free Market is a standard that has proven to work time and again moreso than a controlled market. As evidenced the more control on a market the governemnt has the worse off it is. Having a free market allows for the realm of ingenuity and new inventions. It allows people to work freely and make a profit. Im disgusted by politicians who make the word, "profit" sound like it came straight from Hades. IMO why does it matter if Microsoft, Exxon, Apple, or any random company makes $billions in profit? I don't work for any of those companies, and I pay them for their services. So some politicians tell me I should hate them for their profit. Well, loddy freakin da! Im actually glad that they are making such profits. Its companies like those that make sure thousands of people have jobs and have an income. Some of those large companies are part of the backbone that keep the economy going. You don't like the Free Market, because you believe what others have told you. Well, honestly you are believing lies.

I think that the simplest answer is to look at the economy of his country, and those who have a much less regulated economy over a similar timeframe. The proof is in the pudding.

"Free markets" eventually have large companies swallow small ones, 'till monopolies are built. At that point it becomes impossible for other companies to enter the market and compete against the megacompanies, which leads to exactly the opposite of what you're saying. Microsoft is a great example of this. Ironically, the only way to keep the market truely free is to regulate it.

From what I understand: Maintaing wind power for 50 years is going to be much cheaper than buying fuel for 50 years. Even if it costs €350bn (a whole year's budget) to go 100% wind power, that pretty much means that you'll save huge amounts of money on fuel imports for ages. Once the investment is done, maintaining it is very cheap. What's expensive is building it.

Even on a yearly basis Spain was gaining when it was investing most, according to that Wikipedia article (from Babelfish, copy-pasted part of the text):

Thus, during the year the 2008 premiums to the renewable ones ascended to a total of 2,605 million of euros. Nevertheless, due to the use of native resources, this sector produces significant savings when not concerning fossil or nuclear fuels (2,725 million Euros in 2008), and in the wholesale market of the electricity (by the priority of this type of energies against the conventional ones, 4,919 million Euros in 2008).

Once no more new infrastructure is needed, costs will go dramatically down, also for the consumer. A few billion euros is really not much when we're talking of yearly budgets in developed countries.

I'm talking about wind, solar power is not that big even in Spain and I admit even I don't believe is feasible right now.

This is from what information I have available, nothing more. I know the wikipedia is not always the best source, but this is what I got.

So how did Microsoft prevent the enterance of other companies into the market, exactly?

Concerning monopolies, it is usually far better for industry to have heavy regulation to choke and destroy smaller businesses, than it is for free markets to grow and expand. The bigger the government, the more an industry can maneuver itself into a position to harm growth of smaller companies. Look at the US financial industry: many of the mega banks have poured millions into electing candidates that will push for their regulations that keep them afloat (the past few years are heavily evident of this concerning bailouts among banks and our auto industry).

Comparatively, a free market with fewer regulations ensure a level playing field for all. If a mega corporation cannot leverage the government to enact bills that will favor it, then it must compete against its peers.

Ah, but at what time do you not need any more capacity?

The problem is that if you balance out costs over the lifespan of a wind turbine, it is still marginally more expensive than something like Nuclear.

As per: http://nuclearfissionary.com/2010/04/02/comparing-energy-costs-of-nuclear-coal-gas-wind-and-solar/   cost per KWH of wind power is approximately $0.09. Comparatively, coal and nuclear are less than half the price. Also, this assumes that one can build wind power to their hearts content. Much like solar PV and solar thermal, I wonder if there is enough land to support enough turbines at the current costs.

Regulations are needed in the financial sector. The reason why they didn't work in your country was that you allow private companies to donate money to political parties, and lobby. Make donations and lobbying illegal and you solve your problem.

The ideea is that it's bad either way. In the case of a market with no regulations, companies can essentially do whatever they want, and at one point one company will  become powerfull enough to do whatever it wants. If the market's regulated, the big comapnies influence the Government, and make sure that there will be no laws preventing them to do whatever they want (in this case the solution, as I said above, is making it illegal for companies to influence politicians).

Also, the "level playing field far all" is an illusion of the capitalist system. There's no such thing as a level playing field.