The US Cap And Trade
Legislation
The US cap and trade draft legislation put forward by Henry Waxman and Edward Markey, recently received its seal of approval from the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee. It now looks set to pass into law, possibly as soon as August. With the next global climate pie due to be sliced up in Copenhagen later this year, countries are working to ensure that they have solid emissions targets set and also have in place systems for meeting those targets.
The other largest player in the global pollution game, the European Union (EU), has already set legislation for reducing emissions up to the year 2020.The EU Fine PrintHowever it turns out that the fine print of the EU agreement allows rich companies to pay others for up to 75% of the emissions reductions they need to make. Companies have the option to do this if it works out cheaper for them. In other words, they can sell the problem of pollution reduction to poorer nations and then continue with business as usual. The US CAp And Trade BillThe US legislation is even worse, with the ability of companies to buy 100% of their emission reduction targets. This certainly explains why the bill has received the support it has, with both the government and industry supporting it. I wonder whether it is also supported by the poor whose lives will be affected by this bill in developing nations. Detractors of the Bill in the US say that it will result in the exporting of some heavy energy use industries to countries that have lower energy costs, such as China and India. Other aspects of the US bill are promising, such as the requirement that power companies source 15 percent of their electricity supplies by 2020 from renewable energy sources. There's also the long term goal of reducing emissions by 83% compared to 2005 levels by the year 2050. The Root ProblemWhat the Bill and the EU legislation do not address are the root causes of the majority of global pollution, which is our continuous and largely unnecessary consumption of natural resources. Have a look at the story of stuff for more info. It's great viewing. Original report from Reuters Carbon Community.
27 May 2009
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