The story most conservatives tell about energy policy is different from the stories they tell about other economic-policy matters. Rather than defend free markets, they bang the table about the need for national energy plans and government timetables for energy-plant construction. ...We're told that markets will fail to provide the energy we need, fail to prevent demand for energy from surging beyond reason, and fail to attain such important objectives as environmental quality and a strong national defense.

The conservative case for government intervention in energy markets is just as flimsy as the liberal case for government intervention in any other sector of the economy. Energy markets may not work as perfectly as in a textbook model, but they work — and government works even less perfectly.
- CATO institute article

 

Rather than talk in terms of why we need to subsidize alternative energy to make it more affordable, we need to be talking of the ways we make the economy and laws more profitable to established energy providers through direct subsidies, tax breaks, government involvement, distribution laws, and foreign wars. When true costs are represented in the free market, when the obscuration of government intervention is out of the way, when we no longer bomb oil producing countries "back into the stone age", we will see other energy technologies come on board on their own, at an equitable price.

Some examples of government help to energy industries include (from a linked article):

For instance, the U.S. government has generally propped the industry up with:

• Construction bonds at low interest rates or tax-free
• Research-and-development programs at low or no cost
• Assuming the legal risks of exploration and development in a company's stead
• Below-cost loans with lenient repayment conditions
• Income tax breaks, especially featuring obscure provisions in tax laws designed to receive little congressional oversight when they expire
• Sales tax breaks - taxes on petroleum products are lower than average sales tax rates for other goods
• Giving money to international financial institutions (the U.S. has given tens of billions of dollars to the World Bank and U.S. Export-Import Bank to encourage oil production internationally, according to Friends of the Earth)
• The U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve
• Construction and protection of the nation's highway system
• Allowing the industry to pollute - what would oil cost if the industry had to pay to protect its shipments, and clean up its spills? If the environmental impact of burning petroleum were considered a cost? Or if it were held responsible for the particulate matter in people's lungs, in liability similar to that being asserted in the tobacco industry?
• Relaxing the amount of royalties to be paid (more below)

Don't believe me or the articles below, but do find it in your heart to go out explore and find the truth on your own:

CATO ARTICLES ON NUCLEAR SUBSIDIES
CATO ARTICLES ON OIL SUBSIDIES

Oil Subsidies in the Dock

Market Power - The Mistake of Subsidizing Pet Energy Causes

Hooked on Subsidies

Obama Calls for End of Oil Subsidies in 2011 Budget

U.S. Oil Subsidies Need to Go

Obama budget seeks to end oil, gas subsidies

Oil industry subsidies for dummies