Consider also cases in which government subsidies affect price. The U.S. federal government grants huge subsidies to the nuclear power industry, for example, by limiting the liability that the industry would face in the event of an accident. The federal government also subsidizes the coal, natural gas, and oil industries by granting below-market prices for access to federal lands, tax sup¬port for building pipelines, and by paying for the military protection to secure access to foreign oil supplies. One result of this is that consumers pay much lower energy prices in the United States than they would if the price were set by a fully free and competitive market. Another result is that the alternative energy industry is unable to compete on price.