Carbon trading key terms
Published: April 25 2007 <a href=http://www.ft.com/cms/s/5b7801fe-f34c-11db-9845-000b5df10621,dwp_uuid=3c093daa-edc1-11db-8584-000b5df10621.html>source</a>
Carbon credits: tradeable notional credits resulting from the reduction of greenhouse gases. Measured in tonnes of carbon dioxide
Carbon offset: the production or purchase of a carbon credit intended to cancel out the effect of the purchaser’s emissions
EUETS: the European Union emissions trading scheme, which began on January 1 2005. Its first phase ends on December 31 2007; the second runs from 2008-2012
EUA: EU allowance, a permit to emit one tonne of carbon under the EUETS
Kyoto protocol: international treaty, drawn up in 1997 and which came into effect in 2005. Required developed countries to reduce emissions by 5 per cent, compared with 1990 levels, by 2012. Administered by the secretariat of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. http://unfccc.int.
CDM: clean development mechanism, a provision of the Kyoto protocol by which developed country governments may meet their emissions reduction targets by funding emissions reduction projects in developing countries
ITL: international transaction log, the registry system aimed at ensuring all carbon credits issued under Kyoto are valid
Additionality: principle that carbon credits should only be issued for projects that would not have happened without the financial incentive of carbon credits
CERs: certified emissions reductions, issued by the UN under the Kyoto protocol
VERs: verified (or voluntary) emissions reductions, sold on the voluntary market
Voluntary market: unregulated market for carbon credits, outside the Kyoto protocol and the EUETS
Voluntary carbon standard, gold standard: standards under which projects selling credits in the voluntary market can receive accreditation that they have met certain stringent criteria
Vintage: the year in which carbon credits were generated. It is possible to buy credits years in advance of when the emissions reductions will occur. Some companies will only buy credits generated in the same year as the emissions being offset
Styky's sticky on Carbon Trading
by styky » 04/ 26/ 07 10:43 am
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
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- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by styky » 04/ 27/ 07 10:25 am
NEW CBO REPORT EXPOSES FAILURES OF C02 CAP-AND-TRADE SCHEMES
"The CBO has revealed that a C02 cap-and-trade allocation scheme will result in a transfer of wealth from poor to rich."
WASHINGTON, DC – Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla.), Ranking Member of the Environment & Public Works Committee, today said the new Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report on proposed C02 cap-and-trade legislation was a "devastating indictment." The CBO report laid out the negative impact a cap-and-trade system would have on Americans, in particular, the poor. The CBO report, titled "Trade-Offs in Allocating Allowances for CO2 Emissions," was released on April 25, 2007.
"The CBO report exposes what I have been saying all along: C02 cap-and-trade schemes are an utter failure," Senator Inhofe said. "The CBO has revealed that a C02 cap-and-trade allocation scheme will result in a transfer of wealth from poor to rich. The Democratic leadership has to explain why they are willing to line the pockets of their corporate friends at the expense of the working class.
"Far from being good for the economy, as advocates say, C02 allocation schemes will disproportionately burden the poor, raise taxes, increase government spending, raise gas prices, raise home energy costs and decrease wages. It is hard to imagine the CBO issuing a more devastating indictment of proposed C02 cap-and-trade schemes. The CBO report should be viewed as a stern warning to our elected leaders to avoid symbolic solutions to an alleged climate ‘crisis’ that places the financial burden on America’s poor and working class.
"Today’s report confirms what Europe, Canada and many other nations have come to realize about C02 cap-and-trade schemes: The entire carbon debate has been skewed toward the least effective and most economically damaging of the various approaches.
"Today’s CBO report is the most recent analysis to show the folly of schemes like the Kyoto Protocol. Kyoto, if implemented, would essentially result in the largest tax increase in the history of the U.S., costing an estimated $300 billion a year -- 10 times the cost of the Clinton-Gore tax increase of 1993. And even Kyoto proponents concede that it would have virtually no impact on the climate."
Excerpts from the CBO report (emphasis added):
"Regardless of how the allowances were distributed, most of the cost of meeting a cap on CO2 emissions would be borne by consumers, who would face persistently higher prices for products such as electricity and gasoline. Those price increases would be regressive in that poorer households would bear a larger burden relative to their income than wealthier households would."
"The CBO noted that the proposed cap-and-trade allocation method "would increase producers’ profits without lessening consumers’ costs. In essence, such a strategy would transfer income from energy consumers—among whom lower income households would bear disproportionately large burdens—to shareholders of energy companies, who are disproportionately higher-income households."
"Researchers conclude that much or all of the allowance cost would be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices. Those price increases would disproportionately affect people at the bottom of the income scale. For example, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated that the price rises resulting from a 15 percent cut in CO2 emissions would cost the average household in the lowest one-fifth (quintile) of the income distribution about 3.3 percent of its average income. By comparison, a household in the top quintile would pay about 1.7 percent of its average income."
"A cap-and-trade program for CO2 emissions would tend to increase government spending and decrease revenues."
"The higher prices caused by the cap would lower real (inflation-adjusted) wages and real returns on capital, indirectly raising marginal tax rates on those sources of income."
To read the full CBO report, go to: http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/80xx/doc8027 ... _Trade.pdf
<a href=http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=2e2c7c93-802a-23ad-44db-5de4c507e3cb&Region_id=&Issue_id=>source</a>
"The CBO has revealed that a C02 cap-and-trade allocation scheme will result in a transfer of wealth from poor to rich."
WASHINGTON, DC – Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla.), Ranking Member of the Environment & Public Works Committee, today said the new Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report on proposed C02 cap-and-trade legislation was a "devastating indictment." The CBO report laid out the negative impact a cap-and-trade system would have on Americans, in particular, the poor. The CBO report, titled "Trade-Offs in Allocating Allowances for CO2 Emissions," was released on April 25, 2007.
"The CBO report exposes what I have been saying all along: C02 cap-and-trade schemes are an utter failure," Senator Inhofe said. "The CBO has revealed that a C02 cap-and-trade allocation scheme will result in a transfer of wealth from poor to rich. The Democratic leadership has to explain why they are willing to line the pockets of their corporate friends at the expense of the working class.
"Far from being good for the economy, as advocates say, C02 allocation schemes will disproportionately burden the poor, raise taxes, increase government spending, raise gas prices, raise home energy costs and decrease wages. It is hard to imagine the CBO issuing a more devastating indictment of proposed C02 cap-and-trade schemes. The CBO report should be viewed as a stern warning to our elected leaders to avoid symbolic solutions to an alleged climate ‘crisis’ that places the financial burden on America’s poor and working class.
"Today’s report confirms what Europe, Canada and many other nations have come to realize about C02 cap-and-trade schemes: The entire carbon debate has been skewed toward the least effective and most economically damaging of the various approaches.
"Today’s CBO report is the most recent analysis to show the folly of schemes like the Kyoto Protocol. Kyoto, if implemented, would essentially result in the largest tax increase in the history of the U.S., costing an estimated $300 billion a year -- 10 times the cost of the Clinton-Gore tax increase of 1993. And even Kyoto proponents concede that it would have virtually no impact on the climate."
Excerpts from the CBO report (emphasis added):
"Regardless of how the allowances were distributed, most of the cost of meeting a cap on CO2 emissions would be borne by consumers, who would face persistently higher prices for products such as electricity and gasoline. Those price increases would be regressive in that poorer households would bear a larger burden relative to their income than wealthier households would."
"The CBO noted that the proposed cap-and-trade allocation method "would increase producers’ profits without lessening consumers’ costs. In essence, such a strategy would transfer income from energy consumers—among whom lower income households would bear disproportionately large burdens—to shareholders of energy companies, who are disproportionately higher-income households."
"Researchers conclude that much or all of the allowance cost would be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices. Those price increases would disproportionately affect people at the bottom of the income scale. For example, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated that the price rises resulting from a 15 percent cut in CO2 emissions would cost the average household in the lowest one-fifth (quintile) of the income distribution about 3.3 percent of its average income. By comparison, a household in the top quintile would pay about 1.7 percent of its average income."
"A cap-and-trade program for CO2 emissions would tend to increase government spending and decrease revenues."
"The higher prices caused by the cap would lower real (inflation-adjusted) wages and real returns on capital, indirectly raising marginal tax rates on those sources of income."
To read the full CBO report, go to: http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/80xx/doc8027 ... _Trade.pdf
<a href=http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=2e2c7c93-802a-23ad-44db-5de4c507e3cb&Region_id=&Issue_id=>source</a>
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
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- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by styky » 05/ 04/ 07 11:53 am
Carbon markets are harmful constructs
- 30-Apr-2007
http://www.fundstrategy.co.uk/cgi-bin/i ... ?id=141286
Last week's Financial Times investigation into carbon markets raised fundamental questions in an area where the City hopes to become world leader. They go beyond whether manipulation is taking place.
The FT says there are many examples of "carbon credit" projects yielding few if any environmental benefits. Credits are often worthless and do not lead to reductions in carbon emissions. Many companies profit from doing little. And companies as well as individuals are often charged excessively for European Union (EU) carbon credits.
Two factors seem to be behind such alleged malpractices. First, governments have made available a gross oversupply of permits in the official EU market. Wholesale prices for permits have plunged as a result. Second, many of the companies involved in the carbon offset market have minimal expertise and their activity is often unverified.
Such malpractices should not come as a surprise. In the climate of extreme moral righteousness over global warming many people are so desperate to demonstrate environmental credentials they are ripe for manipulation. In addition, the "markets" for carbon trading are not really markets at all. They are the artificial creations of governments that control how many permits are issued.
The problem at the heart of so-called carbon markets is their acceptance of the polluter pays principle. Although this principle has a superficial appeal - individuals or companies should pay for their pollution - it is divisive and damages innovation.
While it is true that industry, for example, can create environmental costs it also generates huge social benefits. Carbon markets create a way of levying a charge on companies for such costs. Yet there is no equivalent mechanism for paying them for the non-commercial benefits that result from their business.
As a result companies have an incentive to be cautious about innovation. New products or production processes will incur environmental costs. Therefore companies hold back on innovations that could have enormous social benefits.
The costs of pollution should be borne by society as a whole rather than individual firms. Since we all benefit from economic activity the costs of dealing with pollution should be managed collectively.
Carbon trading embodies a principle that is divisive and damages innovation. In addition, it is open to manipulation and involves creating "markets" that are entirely artificial.
- 30-Apr-2007
http://www.fundstrategy.co.uk/cgi-bin/i ... ?id=141286
Last week's Financial Times investigation into carbon markets raised fundamental questions in an area where the City hopes to become world leader. They go beyond whether manipulation is taking place.
The FT says there are many examples of "carbon credit" projects yielding few if any environmental benefits. Credits are often worthless and do not lead to reductions in carbon emissions. Many companies profit from doing little. And companies as well as individuals are often charged excessively for European Union (EU) carbon credits.
Two factors seem to be behind such alleged malpractices. First, governments have made available a gross oversupply of permits in the official EU market. Wholesale prices for permits have plunged as a result. Second, many of the companies involved in the carbon offset market have minimal expertise and their activity is often unverified.
Such malpractices should not come as a surprise. In the climate of extreme moral righteousness over global warming many people are so desperate to demonstrate environmental credentials they are ripe for manipulation. In addition, the "markets" for carbon trading are not really markets at all. They are the artificial creations of governments that control how many permits are issued.
The problem at the heart of so-called carbon markets is their acceptance of the polluter pays principle. Although this principle has a superficial appeal - individuals or companies should pay for their pollution - it is divisive and damages innovation.
While it is true that industry, for example, can create environmental costs it also generates huge social benefits. Carbon markets create a way of levying a charge on companies for such costs. Yet there is no equivalent mechanism for paying them for the non-commercial benefits that result from their business.
As a result companies have an incentive to be cautious about innovation. New products or production processes will incur environmental costs. Therefore companies hold back on innovations that could have enormous social benefits.
The costs of pollution should be borne by society as a whole rather than individual firms. Since we all benefit from economic activity the costs of dealing with pollution should be managed collectively.
Carbon trading embodies a principle that is divisive and damages innovation. In addition, it is open to manipulation and involves creating "markets" that are entirely artificial.
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
-
styky - Member
- Posts: 120244
- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by styky » 05/ 08/ 07 9:24 am
The sin of CO2
Alexander Cockburn
Financial Post
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
In a couple of hundred years, historians will be comparing the frenzies over our supposed human contribution to global warming to the tumults at the latter end of the 10th century as the Christian millennium approached. Then, as now, the doomsters identified human sinfulness as the propulsive factor in the planet's rapid downward slide.
Then as now, a buoyant market throve on fear. The Roman Catholic Church was a bank whose capital was secured by the infinite mercy of Christ, Mary and the Saints, and so the Pope could sell indulgences, like cheques. The sinners established a line of credit against bad behaviour and could go on sinning. Today, a world market in "carbon credits" is in formation. Those whose "carbon footprint" is small can sell their surplus carbon credits to others, less virtuous than themselves.
The modern trade is as fantastical as the medieval one. There is still zero empirical evidence that anthropogenic production of CO2 is making any measurable contribution to the world's present warming trend. The greenhouse fearmongers rely entirely on unverified, crudely oversimplified computer models to finger mankind's sinful contribution. Devoid of any sustaining scientific basis, carbon trafficking is powered by guilt, credulity, cynicism and greed, just like the old indulgences, though at least the latter produced beautiful monuments. By the 16th century, long after the world had sailed safely through the end of the first millennium, Pope Leo X financed the reconstruction of St. Peter's Basilica by offering a "plenary" indulgence, guaranteed to release a soul from purgatory.
Now imagine two lines on a piece of graph paper. The first rises to a crest, then slopes sharply down, then levels off and rises slowly once more. The other has no undulations. It rises in a smooth, slowly increasing arc. The first, wavy line is the worldwide CO2 tonnage produced by humans burning coal, oil and natural gas. On this graph, CO2 starts in 1928 at 1.1 gigatonnes (i.e. 1.1 billion metric tons). It peaks in 1929 at 1.17 gigatons. The world, led by its mightiest power, the United States, plummets into the Great Depression, and by 1932 human CO2 production has fallen to 0.88 gigatonnes a year, a 30% drop. Hard times drove a tougher bargain than all the counsels of Al Gore or the jeremiads of the IPCC (Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change). Then, in 1933 it began to climb slowly again, up to 0.9 gigatons.
And the other line, the one ascending so evenly? That's the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, parts per million (ppm) by volume, moving in 1928 from just under 306, hitting 306 in 1929, to 307 in 1932 and on up. Boom and bust, the line heads up steadily. These days it's at 380. There are, to be sure, seasonal variations in CO2, as measured since 1958 by the instruments on Mauna Loa, Hawaii. (Pre-1958 measurements are of air bubbles trapped in glacial ice.) Summer and winter vary steadily by about five ppm, reflecting photosynthesis cycles. The two lines on that graph proclaim that a whopping 30% cut in man-made CO2 emissions didn't even cause a oneppm drop in the atmosphere's CO2. Thus it is impossible to assert that the increase in atmospheric CO2 stems from human burning of fossil fuels.
I met Dr. Martin Hertzberg, the man who drew that graph and those conclusions, on a Nation cruise back in 2001. He remarked that while he shared many of The Nation's editorial positions, he approved of my reservations on the issue of supposed human contributions to global warming, as outlined in columns I wrote at that time. Hertzberg was a meteorologist for three years in the U.S. Navy, an occupation that gave him a life-long mistrust of climate modelling. Trained in chemistry and physics, a combustion research scientist for most of his career, he's retired now in Copper Mountain, Colo., still consulting from time to time.
Not so long ago, Hertzberg sent me some of his recent papers on the globalwarming hypothesis, a construct now accepted by many progressives as infallible as papal dogma on matters of faith or doctrine. Among them was the graph described above, so devastating to the hypothesis.
As Hertzberg readily acknowledges, the carbon-dioxide content of the atmosphere has increased about 21% in the past century. The world has also been getting just a little bit warmer. The not-very-reliable data on the world's average temperature (which omit most of the world's oceans and remote regions, while overrepresenting urban areas) show about a 0.5C increase in average temperature between 1880 and 1980, and it's still rising, more sharply in the polar regions than elsewhere. But is CO2, at 380 parts per million in the atmosphere, playing a significant role in retaining the 94% of solar radiation that's absorbed in the atmosphere, as against water vapour, also a powerful heat absorber, whose content in humid tropical atmosphere, can be as high as 2%, the equivalent of 20,000 ppm. As Hertzberg says, water in the form of oceans, clouds, snow, ice cover and vapour "is overwhelming in the radiative and energy balance between the earth and the sun. Carbon dioxide and the greenhouse gases are, by comparison, the equivalent of a few farts in a hurricane." And water is exactly that component of the earth's heat balance that the global warming computer models fail to account for.
It's a notorious inconvenience for the Greenhousers that data also show carbon dioxide concentrations from the Eocene period, 20 million years before Henry Ford trundled his first Model T out of the shop, 300-400% higher than current concentrations. The Greenhousers deal with other difficulties like the medieval warming period's higher-than-today's temperatures by straightforward chicanery, misrepresenting tree-ring data (themselves an unreliable guide) and claiming the warming was a local, insignificant European affair.
We're warmer now, because today's world is in the thaw following the last Ice Age. Ice ages correlate with changes in the solar heat we receive, all due to predictable changes in the earth's elliptic orbit round the sun, and in the earth's tilt. As Hertzberg explains, the cyclical heat effect of all of these variables was worked out in great detail between 1915 and 1940 by the Serbian physicist, Milutin Milankovitch, one of the giants of 20th-century astrophysics. In past postglacial cycles, as now, the earth's orbit and tilt gives us more and longer summer days between the equinoxes.
Water covers 71% of the surface of the planet. As compared to the atmosphere, there's at least a hundred times more CO2 in the oceans, dissolved as carbonate. As the postglacial thaw progresses the oceans warm up, and some of the dissolved carbon emits into the atmosphere, just like fizz in soda water taken out of the fridge. "So the greenhouse global warming theory has it ass backwards," Hertzberg concludes. "It is the warming of the earth that is causing the increase of carbon dioxide and not the reverse." He has recently had vivid confirmation of that conclusion. Several new papers show that for the last three quarter million years CO2 changes always lag global temperatures by 800 to 2,600 years.
It looks like Poseidon should go hunting for carbon credits. Trouble is, the human carbon footprint is of zero consequence amid these huge forces and volumes, and that's not even to mention the role of the giant reactor beneath our feet: the earth's increasingly hot molten core.
<a href=http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/comment/story.html?id=89c7f41a-8626-4706-9146-e6efd1764176>source</a>
Alexander Cockburn
Financial Post
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
In a couple of hundred years, historians will be comparing the frenzies over our supposed human contribution to global warming to the tumults at the latter end of the 10th century as the Christian millennium approached. Then, as now, the doomsters identified human sinfulness as the propulsive factor in the planet's rapid downward slide.
Then as now, a buoyant market throve on fear. The Roman Catholic Church was a bank whose capital was secured by the infinite mercy of Christ, Mary and the Saints, and so the Pope could sell indulgences, like cheques. The sinners established a line of credit against bad behaviour and could go on sinning. Today, a world market in "carbon credits" is in formation. Those whose "carbon footprint" is small can sell their surplus carbon credits to others, less virtuous than themselves.
The modern trade is as fantastical as the medieval one. There is still zero empirical evidence that anthropogenic production of CO2 is making any measurable contribution to the world's present warming trend. The greenhouse fearmongers rely entirely on unverified, crudely oversimplified computer models to finger mankind's sinful contribution. Devoid of any sustaining scientific basis, carbon trafficking is powered by guilt, credulity, cynicism and greed, just like the old indulgences, though at least the latter produced beautiful monuments. By the 16th century, long after the world had sailed safely through the end of the first millennium, Pope Leo X financed the reconstruction of St. Peter's Basilica by offering a "plenary" indulgence, guaranteed to release a soul from purgatory.
Now imagine two lines on a piece of graph paper. The first rises to a crest, then slopes sharply down, then levels off and rises slowly once more. The other has no undulations. It rises in a smooth, slowly increasing arc. The first, wavy line is the worldwide CO2 tonnage produced by humans burning coal, oil and natural gas. On this graph, CO2 starts in 1928 at 1.1 gigatonnes (i.e. 1.1 billion metric tons). It peaks in 1929 at 1.17 gigatons. The world, led by its mightiest power, the United States, plummets into the Great Depression, and by 1932 human CO2 production has fallen to 0.88 gigatonnes a year, a 30% drop. Hard times drove a tougher bargain than all the counsels of Al Gore or the jeremiads of the IPCC (Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change). Then, in 1933 it began to climb slowly again, up to 0.9 gigatons.
And the other line, the one ascending so evenly? That's the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, parts per million (ppm) by volume, moving in 1928 from just under 306, hitting 306 in 1929, to 307 in 1932 and on up. Boom and bust, the line heads up steadily. These days it's at 380. There are, to be sure, seasonal variations in CO2, as measured since 1958 by the instruments on Mauna Loa, Hawaii. (Pre-1958 measurements are of air bubbles trapped in glacial ice.) Summer and winter vary steadily by about five ppm, reflecting photosynthesis cycles. The two lines on that graph proclaim that a whopping 30% cut in man-made CO2 emissions didn't even cause a oneppm drop in the atmosphere's CO2. Thus it is impossible to assert that the increase in atmospheric CO2 stems from human burning of fossil fuels.
I met Dr. Martin Hertzberg, the man who drew that graph and those conclusions, on a Nation cruise back in 2001. He remarked that while he shared many of The Nation's editorial positions, he approved of my reservations on the issue of supposed human contributions to global warming, as outlined in columns I wrote at that time. Hertzberg was a meteorologist for three years in the U.S. Navy, an occupation that gave him a life-long mistrust of climate modelling. Trained in chemistry and physics, a combustion research scientist for most of his career, he's retired now in Copper Mountain, Colo., still consulting from time to time.
Not so long ago, Hertzberg sent me some of his recent papers on the globalwarming hypothesis, a construct now accepted by many progressives as infallible as papal dogma on matters of faith or doctrine. Among them was the graph described above, so devastating to the hypothesis.
As Hertzberg readily acknowledges, the carbon-dioxide content of the atmosphere has increased about 21% in the past century. The world has also been getting just a little bit warmer. The not-very-reliable data on the world's average temperature (which omit most of the world's oceans and remote regions, while overrepresenting urban areas) show about a 0.5C increase in average temperature between 1880 and 1980, and it's still rising, more sharply in the polar regions than elsewhere. But is CO2, at 380 parts per million in the atmosphere, playing a significant role in retaining the 94% of solar radiation that's absorbed in the atmosphere, as against water vapour, also a powerful heat absorber, whose content in humid tropical atmosphere, can be as high as 2%, the equivalent of 20,000 ppm. As Hertzberg says, water in the form of oceans, clouds, snow, ice cover and vapour "is overwhelming in the radiative and energy balance between the earth and the sun. Carbon dioxide and the greenhouse gases are, by comparison, the equivalent of a few farts in a hurricane." And water is exactly that component of the earth's heat balance that the global warming computer models fail to account for.
It's a notorious inconvenience for the Greenhousers that data also show carbon dioxide concentrations from the Eocene period, 20 million years before Henry Ford trundled his first Model T out of the shop, 300-400% higher than current concentrations. The Greenhousers deal with other difficulties like the medieval warming period's higher-than-today's temperatures by straightforward chicanery, misrepresenting tree-ring data (themselves an unreliable guide) and claiming the warming was a local, insignificant European affair.
We're warmer now, because today's world is in the thaw following the last Ice Age. Ice ages correlate with changes in the solar heat we receive, all due to predictable changes in the earth's elliptic orbit round the sun, and in the earth's tilt. As Hertzberg explains, the cyclical heat effect of all of these variables was worked out in great detail between 1915 and 1940 by the Serbian physicist, Milutin Milankovitch, one of the giants of 20th-century astrophysics. In past postglacial cycles, as now, the earth's orbit and tilt gives us more and longer summer days between the equinoxes.
Water covers 71% of the surface of the planet. As compared to the atmosphere, there's at least a hundred times more CO2 in the oceans, dissolved as carbonate. As the postglacial thaw progresses the oceans warm up, and some of the dissolved carbon emits into the atmosphere, just like fizz in soda water taken out of the fridge. "So the greenhouse global warming theory has it ass backwards," Hertzberg concludes. "It is the warming of the earth that is causing the increase of carbon dioxide and not the reverse." He has recently had vivid confirmation of that conclusion. Several new papers show that for the last three quarter million years CO2 changes always lag global temperatures by 800 to 2,600 years.
It looks like Poseidon should go hunting for carbon credits. Trouble is, the human carbon footprint is of zero consequence amid these huge forces and volumes, and that's not even to mention the role of the giant reactor beneath our feet: the earth's increasingly hot molten core.
<a href=http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/comment/story.html?id=89c7f41a-8626-4706-9146-e6efd1764176>source</a>
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
-
styky - Member
- Posts: 120244
- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by styky » 05/ 09/ 07 12:05 pm
With thanks to <a href=http://www.junkscience.com/>Junkscience.com</a>
From <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/Index.jsp >CO2 Science </a>this week:
Editorial:
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/EDIT.jsp>Warming-Induced Increases in Ocean Productivity</a>: How, where and why do they occur?
Medieval Warm Period Record of the Week;
This issue's Medieval Warm Period Record of the Week comes from <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/mwp/studies/l2_york.jsp>York</a>, England. To access the entire Medieval Warm Period Project's database, <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/mwp/mwpp.jsp>click here</a>.
Subject Index Summary:
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/subject/p/summaries/precipglobal.jsp>Precipitation (Trends - Global)</a>: Have they been what one would expect if the ongoing rise in the air's CO 2 content is doing what climate alarmists insist it is doing?
Plant Growth Data:
This week we add new results (blue background) of plant growth responses to atmospheric CO 2 enrichment obtained from experiments described in the peer-reviewed scientific literature for: <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/plant_growth/photo/p/prunuss.jsp>Black Cherry</a>, <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/plant_growth/dry/b/brassicao.jsp>Broccoli</a>, <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/plant_growth/dry/e/ecosystem37.jsp>Longleaf Pine Savannahs</a>, and <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/plant_growth/photo/r/raphanuss.jsp>Radish</a>.
Journal Reviews:
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/C1.jsp>The Temperature of the Global Ocean</a>: Is it warming or cooling? Or is there a little (or a lot) of each?
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/C2.jsp>Utah (USA) Snowpack Data</a>: Do they provide any evidence of a regional expression of global warming?
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/B1.jsp>Refining the "Greening of the Sahel"</a>: How has it progressed in terms of both spatial and temporal variability?
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/B2.jsp>Global Warming and Malaria: The Northern Thailand Story</a>: How are the two related?
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/B3.jsp>Is Global Warming Causing the Earth to Burn?</a>: Worldwide fire data provide the answer.
Temperature Record of the Week:
This issue's <a href=http://www.junkscience.com/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/ushcn/stationoftheweek.jsp>Temperature Record of the Week</a> is from Eskridge, KS. During the period of most significant greenhouse gas buildup over the past century, i.e., 1930 and onward, Eskridge's mean annual temperature has cooled by 1.42 degrees Fahrenheit. Not much global warming here! (co2science.org)
Featured scam: <a href=http://www.greenseat.com/>GreenSeat</a> - air travel CO2 offset extortion.
From <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/Index.jsp >CO2 Science </a>this week:
Editorial:
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/EDIT.jsp>Warming-Induced Increases in Ocean Productivity</a>: How, where and why do they occur?
Medieval Warm Period Record of the Week;
This issue's Medieval Warm Period Record of the Week comes from <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/mwp/studies/l2_york.jsp>York</a>, England. To access the entire Medieval Warm Period Project's database, <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/mwp/mwpp.jsp>click here</a>.
Subject Index Summary:
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/subject/p/summaries/precipglobal.jsp>Precipitation (Trends - Global)</a>: Have they been what one would expect if the ongoing rise in the air's CO 2 content is doing what climate alarmists insist it is doing?
Plant Growth Data:
This week we add new results (blue background) of plant growth responses to atmospheric CO 2 enrichment obtained from experiments described in the peer-reviewed scientific literature for: <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/plant_growth/photo/p/prunuss.jsp>Black Cherry</a>, <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/plant_growth/dry/b/brassicao.jsp>Broccoli</a>, <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/plant_growth/dry/e/ecosystem37.jsp>Longleaf Pine Savannahs</a>, and <a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/plant_growth/photo/r/raphanuss.jsp>Radish</a>.
Journal Reviews:
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/C1.jsp>The Temperature of the Global Ocean</a>: Is it warming or cooling? Or is there a little (or a lot) of each?
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/C2.jsp>Utah (USA) Snowpack Data</a>: Do they provide any evidence of a regional expression of global warming?
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/B1.jsp>Refining the "Greening of the Sahel"</a>: How has it progressed in terms of both spatial and temporal variability?
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/B2.jsp>Global Warming and Malaria: The Northern Thailand Story</a>: How are the two related?
<a href=http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N19/B3.jsp>Is Global Warming Causing the Earth to Burn?</a>: Worldwide fire data provide the answer.
Temperature Record of the Week:
This issue's <a href=http://www.junkscience.com/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/data/ushcn/stationoftheweek.jsp>Temperature Record of the Week</a> is from Eskridge, KS. During the period of most significant greenhouse gas buildup over the past century, i.e., 1930 and onward, Eskridge's mean annual temperature has cooled by 1.42 degrees Fahrenheit. Not much global warming here! (co2science.org)
Featured scam: <a href=http://www.greenseat.com/>GreenSeat</a> - air travel CO2 offset extortion.
- Question, when calculating the "damage" done by CO2 emission, is there any allowance for the massive good of underwriting global primary productivity with this same trace gas liberation?
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
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New Website Offers Carbon Debits to Take Away Al Gore's
by styky » 05/ 16/ 07 4:46 pm
New Website Offers Carbon Debits to Take Away Al Gore's Meaningless Carbon Credits
http://newsbusters.org/node/12794
Posted by Noel Sheppard on May 16, 2007 - 14:00.
This is way too funny, and by now, you should know the drill concerning potables, combustibles, and sharp objects. You've been warned!
A website has surfaced that is “on a mission to take away every one of Al Gore's meaningless carbon credits by simply providing carbon debits.”
Called “<a href=http://www.carboncreditkillers.com/default.asp>Carbon Credit Killers</a>” (h/t <a href=http://instapundit.com/archives2/005225.php>Glenn Reynolds</a>), the proprietors “run a burgeoning business of clearing trees from grasslands so the Antelope won’t be scared.”
Their Deluxe Package includes:
In reality, I have no idea whether this is serious, or just a brilliant way to sell t-shirts and marketing material.
Regardless, I can’t stop laughing.
http://newsbusters.org/node/12794
Posted by Noel Sheppard on May 16, 2007 - 14:00.
This is way too funny, and by now, you should know the drill concerning potables, combustibles, and sharp objects. You've been warned!
A website has surfaced that is “on a mission to take away every one of Al Gore's meaningless carbon credits by simply providing carbon debits.”
Called “<a href=http://www.carboncreditkillers.com/default.asp>Carbon Credit Killers</a>” (h/t <a href=http://instapundit.com/archives2/005225.php>Glenn Reynolds</a>), the proprietors “run a burgeoning business of clearing trees from grasslands so the Antelope won’t be scared.”
Their Deluxe Package includes:
- *Kill (Shred) 1 Living Tree (see pictures of this being done)
*Send an email to Al Gore about your civic mindedness in buying Carbon Debits.
*Send an email to you certifying you are doing your part to save the Earth from Carbon Credits.
*1 shirt of your choice (specify style and size in notes at check-out).
*Pictures of the Tree with Your Plaque both Before and After it has been shredded
*And we will send you the plaque with a commemorative piece of the tree attached.
In reality, I have no idea whether this is serious, or just a brilliant way to sell t-shirts and marketing material.
Regardless, I can’t stop laughing.
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
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- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by styky » 06/ 05/ 07 11:51 am
<a href=http://newsbusters.org/node/13171>When will media report the Kyoto Carbon con?</a> "There’s a huge financial scam being cynically perpetrated on the people of the world that, for the most part, American media are not reporting: the Kyoto Carbon Con.
What makes this silence so astounding is that the press love stories about corporations and governments bilking people out of their life savings.
Take for example the media’s fascination with Enron in the early part of this decade, or more recently all of the focus on oil company profits and supposed price gouging at the pumps.
Yet, despite the predictable media mania for such financial schemes, press outlets have largely ignored the con game involved with anthropogenic global warming irrespective of the billions of dollars at stake." (Noel Sheppard, News Busters)
What makes this silence so astounding is that the press love stories about corporations and governments bilking people out of their life savings.
Take for example the media’s fascination with Enron in the early part of this decade, or more recently all of the focus on oil company profits and supposed price gouging at the pumps.
Yet, despite the predictable media mania for such financial schemes, press outlets have largely ignored the con game involved with anthropogenic global warming irrespective of the billions of dollars at stake." (Noel Sheppard, News Busters)
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
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- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by concan » 06/ 05/ 07 2:07 pm
styky wrote:The psychotherapist clicked on a website that helped her calculate how much heat-trapping carbon dioxide she and her fiance emitted each year, mostly by driving and heating their home. Then she paid $150 to e-BlueHorizons.com, a company that promises to offset emissions.
So, let me get this straight.
Somebody feels guilted out about the whole climate change and carbon footprint debate and decides to pay a pennance to an online business that promises to put that money to good works...
Hmm, sounds like a religious establishment to me.
They say that if you don't believe in God you will believe in anything.
Is it morally sound to get into the business of collecting money from people that want to give it away simply to feel good about their indulgence in driving a car or heating a house?
Can a Christian venture into this business of helping these people with their guilt and take their money?
Who is interested in making some hay for the kingdom?
- concan
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by styky » 10/ 30/ 07 1:01 pm
TAKING CO2 SERIOUSLY
David F. Noble and Denis G. Rancourt
http://climateguy.blogspot.com/2007/05/ ... ously.html
The Swift Institute on Global Warming
May, 2007
Life is deadly. All living things that breathe oxygen burn their food and emit poisonous CO2 as a pollutant. With every breath they contribute to the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, and, hence, to global warming. And yet, for all the frantic formulas floating around aimed at the reduction of CO2 emissions, particularly through limitations on the burning of fossils fuels (dead living things), little attention has been paid to this obvious other source (still living things). Rough calculations suggest that CO2 emissions from the burning of fossil fuels are dwarfed by the emissions from these living things, including human beings. Emissions from human metabolism alone, assuming a world population of six billion people and an averaging of their state of activity, are estimated to be equivalent to approximately half of 1990 fossil fuel emissions. Add to these human sources the CO2 emissions from all other creatures on the planet, including plants which respire as well as photosynthesize, and the total amount of emissions from living things is staggering.
To forestall the forecasted calamities of global warming, there must be a reduction of “living things emissions” (LTE’s). This can be approached in two ways, by reducing the number of living things, through their humane or not so humane elimination, and by reducing the amount of respiration of each living thing, through enforceable limits on exertion. With regard to the first, we appear to be well on our way. The loss of habitat through development, deforestation, and agribusiness has contributed greatly to loss of life and species extinction. Warfare will continue to contribute significantly as well, along with genocide. Human and animal population control and sterilization further limit LTE’s. All of this is a good start, but just a start. It’s time to let go of our pets. The number of livestock on farms, which has swelled enormously, could be cut back substantially with the elimination of meat from our diet. We must also begin to give serious consideration to euthanizing expendable members of our family and community. With regard to worklife and lifestyle, we must work hard at not working hard, thereby lowering our metabolism, respiring less, and reducing our CO2 emissions. The impulse to exercise must be exorcised, along with fitness clubs, marathons, and organized sports. Caffeine, which speeds up metabolism, must be banned. The work ethic must be replaced by yoga and meditation. Only by minimizing all effort will we survive. If we are serious about reducing CO2 emissions, we must all do our part, as little as possible.
David F. Noble and Denis G. Rancourt
http://climateguy.blogspot.com/2007/05/ ... ously.html
The Swift Institute on Global Warming
May, 2007
Life is deadly. All living things that breathe oxygen burn their food and emit poisonous CO2 as a pollutant. With every breath they contribute to the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, and, hence, to global warming. And yet, for all the frantic formulas floating around aimed at the reduction of CO2 emissions, particularly through limitations on the burning of fossils fuels (dead living things), little attention has been paid to this obvious other source (still living things). Rough calculations suggest that CO2 emissions from the burning of fossil fuels are dwarfed by the emissions from these living things, including human beings. Emissions from human metabolism alone, assuming a world population of six billion people and an averaging of their state of activity, are estimated to be equivalent to approximately half of 1990 fossil fuel emissions. Add to these human sources the CO2 emissions from all other creatures on the planet, including plants which respire as well as photosynthesize, and the total amount of emissions from living things is staggering.
To forestall the forecasted calamities of global warming, there must be a reduction of “living things emissions” (LTE’s). This can be approached in two ways, by reducing the number of living things, through their humane or not so humane elimination, and by reducing the amount of respiration of each living thing, through enforceable limits on exertion. With regard to the first, we appear to be well on our way. The loss of habitat through development, deforestation, and agribusiness has contributed greatly to loss of life and species extinction. Warfare will continue to contribute significantly as well, along with genocide. Human and animal population control and sterilization further limit LTE’s. All of this is a good start, but just a start. It’s time to let go of our pets. The number of livestock on farms, which has swelled enormously, could be cut back substantially with the elimination of meat from our diet. We must also begin to give serious consideration to euthanizing expendable members of our family and community. With regard to worklife and lifestyle, we must work hard at not working hard, thereby lowering our metabolism, respiring less, and reducing our CO2 emissions. The impulse to exercise must be exorcised, along with fitness clubs, marathons, and organized sports. Caffeine, which speeds up metabolism, must be banned. The work ethic must be replaced by yoga and meditation. Only by minimizing all effort will we survive. If we are serious about reducing CO2 emissions, we must all do our part, as little as possible.
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
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by fourhorses » 11/ 03/ 07 10:29 pm
Japan Needs Measures to Avert $10.5 Billion Carbon Credit Cost
By Shigeru Sato
Oct. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Japan needs to implement measures to lower greenhouse gas emissions and avoid a bill of as much as 1.2 trillion yen ($10.5 billion) to buy carbon credits in global markets, a government report says.
Japan may fail to cut emissions and meet the target set out in the Kyoto Protocol, forcing the government to increase spending on credits to offset higher industrial pollution, the report by the finance ministry's fiscal system council said. Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda's government is reviewing plans to achieve the nation's goal under the United Nations treaty.
``Our tax payers won't accept the financial strain,'' the finance ministry panel said in the report.
Japan must cut annual emissions during the five years starting April 2008 by 6 percent from the level in 1990. Japan emitted 7.8 percent more of the polluting gases in the year ended March 2006 than in 1990, driven by a 37 percent surge in household output and an 18 percent increase from transport- related sources.
The Japanese government initially planned to spend 200 billion yen in the five years through March 2013 to buy 20 million metric tons worth of the carbon credits annually, the report posted on the ministry's Web site showed. Growing emissions forced the government to seek an alternative solution.
Additional government spending for carbon-credit purchases is among the possible measures, said Kuniyuki Nishimura, research director of Mitsubishi Research Institute Inc.'s global warming division in Tokyo.
Carbon Tax
``The government may have to introduce a carbon tax to procure the financial resources,'' he said.
The environment ministry has proposed imposing a tax of 2,400 yen on each ton of carbon emitted by households using kerosene and liquefied petroleum gas, the main heating and cooking fuels. Under the proposal, the tax will also be levied on the consumption of coal, heavy fuel oil and natural gas, which are used to power boilers and in-house power generators in factories.
Under the 1997 Kyoto treaty's Clean Development Mechanism, or CDM, polluters in developed nations can buy credits to offset the harmful gases they produce by investing in projects that cut greenhouse gas emissions in developing countries. Polluters are also allowed to buy credits from the project operators.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= ... efer=japan
By Shigeru Sato
Oct. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Japan needs to implement measures to lower greenhouse gas emissions and avoid a bill of as much as 1.2 trillion yen ($10.5 billion) to buy carbon credits in global markets, a government report says.
Japan may fail to cut emissions and meet the target set out in the Kyoto Protocol, forcing the government to increase spending on credits to offset higher industrial pollution, the report by the finance ministry's fiscal system council said. Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda's government is reviewing plans to achieve the nation's goal under the United Nations treaty.
``Our tax payers won't accept the financial strain,'' the finance ministry panel said in the report.
Japan must cut annual emissions during the five years starting April 2008 by 6 percent from the level in 1990. Japan emitted 7.8 percent more of the polluting gases in the year ended March 2006 than in 1990, driven by a 37 percent surge in household output and an 18 percent increase from transport- related sources.
The Japanese government initially planned to spend 200 billion yen in the five years through March 2013 to buy 20 million metric tons worth of the carbon credits annually, the report posted on the ministry's Web site showed. Growing emissions forced the government to seek an alternative solution.
Additional government spending for carbon-credit purchases is among the possible measures, said Kuniyuki Nishimura, research director of Mitsubishi Research Institute Inc.'s global warming division in Tokyo.
Carbon Tax
``The government may have to introduce a carbon tax to procure the financial resources,'' he said.
The environment ministry has proposed imposing a tax of 2,400 yen on each ton of carbon emitted by households using kerosene and liquefied petroleum gas, the main heating and cooking fuels. Under the proposal, the tax will also be levied on the consumption of coal, heavy fuel oil and natural gas, which are used to power boilers and in-house power generators in factories.
Under the 1997 Kyoto treaty's Clean Development Mechanism, or CDM, polluters in developed nations can buy credits to offset the harmful gases they produce by investing in projects that cut greenhouse gas emissions in developing countries. Polluters are also allowed to buy credits from the project operators.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= ... efer=japan
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fourhorses - Posts: 23902
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by styky » 12/ 14/ 07 1:01 pm
And here we have it....this is what it's all about for the UN 
It's about the money and has nothing to do with saving anything.
(sorry folks but I couldn't get the link to shorten
)
http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm? ... 6&Issue_id
Global Carbon Tax Urged at UN Climate Conference
BALI, Indonesia – A global tax on carbon dioxide emissions was urged to help save the Earth from catastrophic man-made global warming at the United Nations climate conference. A panel of UN participants on Thursday urged the adoption of a tax that would represent “a global burden sharing system, fair, with solidarity, and legally binding to all nations.”..........................
It's about the money and has nothing to do with saving anything.
(sorry folks but I couldn't get the link to shorten
)
http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm? ... 6&Issue_id
Global Carbon Tax Urged at UN Climate Conference
BALI, Indonesia – A global tax on carbon dioxide emissions was urged to help save the Earth from catastrophic man-made global warming at the United Nations climate conference. A panel of UN participants on Thursday urged the adoption of a tax that would represent “a global burden sharing system, fair, with solidarity, and legally binding to all nations.”..........................
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
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by styky » 11/ 13/ 08 5:28 pm
The cost and futility of trading hot air
Why carbon ‘cap-and-trade’ is an immoral non-solution to a non-problem
The “Environmental Defence Fund” (EDF) has circulated a “Report ” that says the cost of controlling the “pollution that causes ‘global warming’” is “only pennies a day … almost too small to measure.” The conclusions, summarized by EDF, are –
• “We cannot afford to wait. Further delay will greatly increase the costs of making necessary emissions cuts and will risk locking in irreversible climate change.” The “Report” says: “The scientific consensus is clear: Global ‘warming’ is real, and it is already happening. While nobody can be certain about the exact timing or location of its consequences, the possible severity of those consequences is becoming increasingly clear. Allowing greenhouse gas emissions to increase unchecked is an invitation to catastrophe. The potential consequences of warming include widespread famine, triggered by extreme drought in the major grain-producing areas of the world; the wholesale disappearance of the world's coral reefs; and sea levels rising by several meters over the course of a few centuries.” The “Report” concludes that we must act now to avoid “catastrophic climate change”. <a href=http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/monckton/cost_and_futility_of_trading_hot_air.html>full article</a>
Why carbon ‘cap-and-trade’ is an immoral non-solution to a non-problem
The “Environmental Defence Fund” (EDF) has circulated a “Report ” that says the cost of controlling the “pollution that causes ‘global warming’” is “only pennies a day … almost too small to measure.” The conclusions, summarized by EDF, are –
• “We cannot afford to wait. Further delay will greatly increase the costs of making necessary emissions cuts and will risk locking in irreversible climate change.” The “Report” says: “The scientific consensus is clear: Global ‘warming’ is real, and it is already happening. While nobody can be certain about the exact timing or location of its consequences, the possible severity of those consequences is becoming increasingly clear. Allowing greenhouse gas emissions to increase unchecked is an invitation to catastrophe. The potential consequences of warming include widespread famine, triggered by extreme drought in the major grain-producing areas of the world; the wholesale disappearance of the world's coral reefs; and sea levels rising by several meters over the course of a few centuries.” The “Report” concludes that we must act now to avoid “catastrophic climate change”. <a href=http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/monckton/cost_and_futility_of_trading_hot_air.html>full article</a>
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
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- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by styky » 02/ 26/ 09 10:56 am
http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm? ... 2d53f00437
Scientist Tells Congress: Earth in ‘CO2 Famine’ - ‘The increase of CO2 is not a cause for alarm and will be good for mankind’
‘Children should not be force-fed propaganda, masquerading as science’
Washington, DC — Award-winning Princeton University Physicist Dr. Will Happer declared man-made global warming fears “mistaken” and noted that the Earth was currently in a “CO2 famine now.” Happer, who has published over 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers, made his remarks during today’s Environment and Public Works Full Committee Hearing entitled <a href=http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Hearings.Hearing&Hearing_ID=864d3319-802a-23ad-46a0-15d3b819178d>“Update on the Latest Global Warming Science.”</a>
“Many people don’t realize that over geological time, we’re really in a CO2 famine now. Almost never has CO2 levels been as low as it has been in the Holocene (geologic epoch) – 280 (parts per million - ppm) – that’s unheard of. Most of the time [CO2 levels] have been at least 1000 (ppm) and it’s been quite higher than that,” Happer told the Senate Committee. To read Happer’s complete opening statement <a href=http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Hearings.Testimony&Hearing_ID=864d3319-802a-23ad-46a0-15d3b819178d&Witness_ID=7e0930c4-f99f-48fd-bdd2-df4ae79f27ef>click here</a>. (EPW Blog)
Scientist Tells Congress: Earth in ‘CO2 Famine’ - ‘The increase of CO2 is not a cause for alarm and will be good for mankind’
‘Children should not be force-fed propaganda, masquerading as science’
Washington, DC — Award-winning Princeton University Physicist Dr. Will Happer declared man-made global warming fears “mistaken” and noted that the Earth was currently in a “CO2 famine now.” Happer, who has published over 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers, made his remarks during today’s Environment and Public Works Full Committee Hearing entitled <a href=http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Hearings.Hearing&Hearing_ID=864d3319-802a-23ad-46a0-15d3b819178d>“Update on the Latest Global Warming Science.”</a>
“Many people don’t realize that over geological time, we’re really in a CO2 famine now. Almost never has CO2 levels been as low as it has been in the Holocene (geologic epoch) – 280 (parts per million - ppm) – that’s unheard of. Most of the time [CO2 levels] have been at least 1000 (ppm) and it’s been quite higher than that,” Happer told the Senate Committee. To read Happer’s complete opening statement <a href=http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Hearings.Testimony&Hearing_ID=864d3319-802a-23ad-46a0-15d3b819178d&Witness_ID=7e0930c4-f99f-48fd-bdd2-df4ae79f27ef>click here</a>. (EPW Blog)
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
- Posts: 120244
- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by styky » 08/ 07/ 09 11:34 am
Robert Gottliebsen
<a href=http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Trading-carbon-for-disaster-pd20090807-UNS4L?OpenDocument&src=kgb>source</a>
Trading carbon for disaster
7 Aug 2009
It has no comparison in importance, but like the Washington Post writers on Watergate, every time I write on the Australian carbon crisis I feel this will be my last commentary on the subject. But every time I write, new information is put before me to encourage me to keep going.
Such is the power of Business Spectator that yesterday most of the players, excluding the Canberra public service, met with me (and Alan Kohler and Steve Bartholomeusz) under the 'Chatham House Rule'. What they told us had me reeling. Much of what I am about to write will be denied but have no doubt it is true. Having got through the GFC this is without doubt Australia’s biggest looming crisis and it will effect all citizens.
Effectively large segments of global energy capital will either black ban Australia or demand much higher returns with enormous consequences to this nation, including consequences for new renewable energy projects.
But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s go step by step through what is about to happen to our nation because of an inexperienced government and an incompetent opposition.
-- In most parts of the world, apart from Australia, it is believed that the form of carbon trading scheme being proposed by Australia will not promote investment in lower carbon energy alternatives. We are about to prove the rest of the world right.
-- When a nation or a company is doing something stupid there will be a trigger that explodes the wrong strategy. In this case it is the Latrobe Valley brown coal power stations. These stations have huge debt repayments and emit a lot of carbon so the Canberra plan was that they should go broke and be bought at token prices. The plan was that the market would do its job and the power companies that own the stations and the banks that funded them will suffer well-deserved losses because they knew the risks they were taking when they made the investments and loans. If only it were so simple.
-- There are a number of large global players who invested in the Latrobe Valley, and they have not had big returns. The accepted practice in the US and Europe is that while there are no big profits for investors in legacy coal power stations there are no big losses. The power station owning groups need to have strong balance sheets to invest in renewable, gas and other low carbon power generating alternatives. Australia is thumbing its nose at the giants and global bankers and wants the world to follow us. We are about to learn what happens when you play that game and get it wrong.
-- The first step is that a number of the Latrobe Valley companies will halt long term maintenance. TRUenergy has already announced this, but at least one or two other Latrobe stations follow. The power stations say who in their right mind would spend cash when they have no idea whether the generators will be viable in the short and long term because the level of carbon charges and carbon policy is not known. Last summer every Latrobe Valley station went without a break down – the first time that has happened. This summer the odds are that they will break down. The companies are gradually abandoning long term contracts and going for the spot market which means that when there is a power station failure they will go into an Australian wide bidding process for power sending prices through the roof. However, there is a limited amount that can be sent to Victoria so Victorians will have the main burden of the price hikes and blackouts.
-- The banks will have the power to take control of at least one Latrobe Valley power station within six to nine months. They will be trying to extract as much money from the station as possible so will also cease long term maintenance and go for spot prices. If Australian and Victoria think the blackouts next summer are going to be bad wait for the following year when the full impact hits the nation.
-- Victorian Premier John Brumby’s staff know exactly what is going to happen to their state and realise that although this is a Canberra induced crisis they will cop the blame. Brumby’s people have gone to Canberra and been met with a wall of Godwin Greches. They might not fake emails, but they have no interest what so ever in the truth about what is going to happen. Fortunately there are some signs that not all the Canberra public servants are trained in the Godwin Grech mould and one or two are showing interest in discovering the facts.
So how do we get out of this? Step one is to vote down the crazy carbon trading legislation and forget the massive grants needed to offset the cost of carbon permits.
There will be no double dissolution because by the time one is due the disaster will be apparent. We have to devise a plan that phases out brown coal without sending the stations broke. We will need to foster low carbon gas-fired stations in the Latrobe Valley plus a lot more renewable projects. What we will need is a carbon-certain environment.
I don’t think the answer can be found in Canberra. If we go to China, the US, India or Europe we will find answers.
But if all else fails, and to ensure that you're fully abreast of the situation, read my commentaries.
Here are a few to start with:
Power at any price, December 18, 2008; A monumental failing, July 14; Infrastructure on the edge of a cliff, July 15; New energy cant wait, July 15; Charging into the abyss, July 21; Kennedy's power play, July 23; Our carbon trading blunder, July 30; A precarious balance, August 5; The carbon tax chorus, August 6; and also have a look at Alan Kohler's Carbon tax by proxy, August 6.
<a href=http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Trading-carbon-for-disaster-pd20090807-UNS4L?OpenDocument&src=kgb>source</a>
Trading carbon for disaster
7 Aug 2009
It has no comparison in importance, but like the Washington Post writers on Watergate, every time I write on the Australian carbon crisis I feel this will be my last commentary on the subject. But every time I write, new information is put before me to encourage me to keep going.
Such is the power of Business Spectator that yesterday most of the players, excluding the Canberra public service, met with me (and Alan Kohler and Steve Bartholomeusz) under the 'Chatham House Rule'. What they told us had me reeling. Much of what I am about to write will be denied but have no doubt it is true. Having got through the GFC this is without doubt Australia’s biggest looming crisis and it will effect all citizens.
Effectively large segments of global energy capital will either black ban Australia or demand much higher returns with enormous consequences to this nation, including consequences for new renewable energy projects.
But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s go step by step through what is about to happen to our nation because of an inexperienced government and an incompetent opposition.
-- In most parts of the world, apart from Australia, it is believed that the form of carbon trading scheme being proposed by Australia will not promote investment in lower carbon energy alternatives. We are about to prove the rest of the world right.
-- When a nation or a company is doing something stupid there will be a trigger that explodes the wrong strategy. In this case it is the Latrobe Valley brown coal power stations. These stations have huge debt repayments and emit a lot of carbon so the Canberra plan was that they should go broke and be bought at token prices. The plan was that the market would do its job and the power companies that own the stations and the banks that funded them will suffer well-deserved losses because they knew the risks they were taking when they made the investments and loans. If only it were so simple.
-- There are a number of large global players who invested in the Latrobe Valley, and they have not had big returns. The accepted practice in the US and Europe is that while there are no big profits for investors in legacy coal power stations there are no big losses. The power station owning groups need to have strong balance sheets to invest in renewable, gas and other low carbon power generating alternatives. Australia is thumbing its nose at the giants and global bankers and wants the world to follow us. We are about to learn what happens when you play that game and get it wrong.
-- The first step is that a number of the Latrobe Valley companies will halt long term maintenance. TRUenergy has already announced this, but at least one or two other Latrobe stations follow. The power stations say who in their right mind would spend cash when they have no idea whether the generators will be viable in the short and long term because the level of carbon charges and carbon policy is not known. Last summer every Latrobe Valley station went without a break down – the first time that has happened. This summer the odds are that they will break down. The companies are gradually abandoning long term contracts and going for the spot market which means that when there is a power station failure they will go into an Australian wide bidding process for power sending prices through the roof. However, there is a limited amount that can be sent to Victoria so Victorians will have the main burden of the price hikes and blackouts.
-- The banks will have the power to take control of at least one Latrobe Valley power station within six to nine months. They will be trying to extract as much money from the station as possible so will also cease long term maintenance and go for spot prices. If Australian and Victoria think the blackouts next summer are going to be bad wait for the following year when the full impact hits the nation.
-- Victorian Premier John Brumby’s staff know exactly what is going to happen to their state and realise that although this is a Canberra induced crisis they will cop the blame. Brumby’s people have gone to Canberra and been met with a wall of Godwin Greches. They might not fake emails, but they have no interest what so ever in the truth about what is going to happen. Fortunately there are some signs that not all the Canberra public servants are trained in the Godwin Grech mould and one or two are showing interest in discovering the facts.
So how do we get out of this? Step one is to vote down the crazy carbon trading legislation and forget the massive grants needed to offset the cost of carbon permits.
There will be no double dissolution because by the time one is due the disaster will be apparent. We have to devise a plan that phases out brown coal without sending the stations broke. We will need to foster low carbon gas-fired stations in the Latrobe Valley plus a lot more renewable projects. What we will need is a carbon-certain environment.
I don’t think the answer can be found in Canberra. If we go to China, the US, India or Europe we will find answers.
But if all else fails, and to ensure that you're fully abreast of the situation, read my commentaries.
Here are a few to start with:
Power at any price, December 18, 2008; A monumental failing, July 14; Infrastructure on the edge of a cliff, July 15; New energy cant wait, July 15; Charging into the abyss, July 21; Kennedy's power play, July 23; Our carbon trading blunder, July 30; A precarious balance, August 5; The carbon tax chorus, August 6; and also have a look at Alan Kohler's Carbon tax by proxy, August 6.
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
-
styky - Member
- Posts: 120244
- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
by styky » 09/ 16/ 09 1:13 pm
The carbon casino caught with it’s pants down (again)
Another major carbon auditor goes down.
http://joannenova.com.au/2009/09/the-ca ... own-again/
Norway’s DNV (Det Norse Veritas, “The Norwegian Truth”) was the largest auditor of the infamous CDM’s (Clean Development Mechanisms) until it was suspended last December when it was caught selling carbon credits for projects it hadn’t checked. At the time it was so large it had approved fully half of all CDM credits on the market. Its excess workload was transferred to number two auditor, SGS, and shock, this week, SGS has been caught and suspended because it couldn’t prove it’s staff had properly vetted projects either. Indeed it couldn’t show that they were even trained to do that vetting. (Did SGS not see this coming?)
When the West offered money to buy the rights to air-with-slightly-less-carbon-dioxide-than-it-could-have-had, China and India put up their hands and said “Yes please” 900 times. And why wouldn’t they? CDMs are worth about 20% of all emissions trades, which amounted to $126 billion in 2008. Up until the global financial crisis it was doubling annually, like all good ponzi schemes do.
This supposedly “free market” has none of the normal limits which make it hard for companies to get away with cheating … namely a connection to real material goods: usually if you don’t have it, you can’t sell it. But with carbon credits, customers can buy fake products and never know the difference — even after it’s “delivered”. That’s what you get when you deal in atmospheric nullities.
It might be called a “carbon market”, but remember that no one actually trades carbon, they trade rights to emit air with less carbon, and it’s not even as physical as air with less carbon than it used to have (something we can measure). No, it’s worse than that: it’s air with less carbon than it might have had.
So it’s an underwhelming surprise that the top two auditors have both been caught selling “Credits for emitting air that might-have-had-more-carbon-in-it, which might-have-been-checked by people who might-have-been-qualified to check these things”. Selling bridges in Boston has more respectability.
Fortunately, because carbon doesn’t appear to make much difference to the climate, whether the schemes work or not is a moot point. Arguably, if The Point is assuaging western guilt for our successes, then an imaginary credit is just as good as a real one. It’s one of those rare occasions where the placebo effect is 90% effective.
Ultimately this is a market that depends on unknowable, unprovable motivations: I wouldn’t have cleaned up or closed down my dirty factory without all that money. Really. And by the way, I’m thinking of building another one just like it… (Oi! want to pay me not to build it?)
Mass marketing meets the Emperors new clothes — with undertones of extortion. This is how we save the world?
Recent legislation has tried to close some of the loopholes, and like everything, there are honest operators out there among the crooks. But seriously. It’s like knitting a battleship and hoping to make it waterproof with bureaucrats. It’s not a question of closing loopholes — it IS a loophole. There is almost nothing we can actually pin down — it’s an open invitation for scammers and con-artists. The mat at the door says: “All Rorters Welcome. If we catch you cheating we’ll change the rules. Next time you’ll have to cheat differently.”
“It’s not as if we’re printing money in a garage,” Yvo de Boer, U.N. climate chief, said of the credits. Which is true, there are no garages involved. Just large multinational corporations.
And it’s not as if the funds transfer from the West to the Third world is helping the poor people in the street. The billions of dollars in payments often end up with the financial brokers in London, and with potentially corrupt bureaucrats in China. Interviews with locals near the Xiaoxi dam project suggest people were evicted from their homes, and were not paid enough compensation to buy new homes. The money for the credits associated with the dam was supposed to reduce carbon emissions, yet construction for the Dam started a full two years before the application for CDM funding was even entered. What looks like a Dam, acts like a Dam, but isn’t…?
Bureaucrat-ite may work like a glue plugging holes, but it repels free-markets. Too many bureaucrats and too many rules makes a free market “fixed” in every sense of the word. But the carbon-that-might-have-been-released market can’t be a bureaucrat-free, free-market. It has to be a bureaucrat-rich. The only thing “free” about this market is the price people would pay for carbon-which-might-have-been-released-but-wasn’t.
Another major carbon auditor goes down.
http://joannenova.com.au/2009/09/the-ca ... own-again/
Norway’s DNV (Det Norse Veritas, “The Norwegian Truth”) was the largest auditor of the infamous CDM’s (Clean Development Mechanisms) until it was suspended last December when it was caught selling carbon credits for projects it hadn’t checked. At the time it was so large it had approved fully half of all CDM credits on the market. Its excess workload was transferred to number two auditor, SGS, and shock, this week, SGS has been caught and suspended because it couldn’t prove it’s staff had properly vetted projects either. Indeed it couldn’t show that they were even trained to do that vetting. (Did SGS not see this coming?)
When the West offered money to buy the rights to air-with-slightly-less-carbon-dioxide-than-it-could-have-had, China and India put up their hands and said “Yes please” 900 times. And why wouldn’t they? CDMs are worth about 20% of all emissions trades, which amounted to $126 billion in 2008. Up until the global financial crisis it was doubling annually, like all good ponzi schemes do.
This supposedly “free market” has none of the normal limits which make it hard for companies to get away with cheating … namely a connection to real material goods: usually if you don’t have it, you can’t sell it. But with carbon credits, customers can buy fake products and never know the difference — even after it’s “delivered”. That’s what you get when you deal in atmospheric nullities.
It might be called a “carbon market”, but remember that no one actually trades carbon, they trade rights to emit air with less carbon, and it’s not even as physical as air with less carbon than it used to have (something we can measure). No, it’s worse than that: it’s air with less carbon than it might have had.
So it’s an underwhelming surprise that the top two auditors have both been caught selling “Credits for emitting air that might-have-had-more-carbon-in-it, which might-have-been-checked by people who might-have-been-qualified to check these things”. Selling bridges in Boston has more respectability.
Fortunately, because carbon doesn’t appear to make much difference to the climate, whether the schemes work or not is a moot point. Arguably, if The Point is assuaging western guilt for our successes, then an imaginary credit is just as good as a real one. It’s one of those rare occasions where the placebo effect is 90% effective.
Ultimately this is a market that depends on unknowable, unprovable motivations: I wouldn’t have cleaned up or closed down my dirty factory without all that money. Really. And by the way, I’m thinking of building another one just like it… (Oi! want to pay me not to build it?)
Mass marketing meets the Emperors new clothes — with undertones of extortion. This is how we save the world?
Recent legislation has tried to close some of the loopholes, and like everything, there are honest operators out there among the crooks. But seriously. It’s like knitting a battleship and hoping to make it waterproof with bureaucrats. It’s not a question of closing loopholes — it IS a loophole. There is almost nothing we can actually pin down — it’s an open invitation for scammers and con-artists. The mat at the door says: “All Rorters Welcome. If we catch you cheating we’ll change the rules. Next time you’ll have to cheat differently.”
“It’s not as if we’re printing money in a garage,” Yvo de Boer, U.N. climate chief, said of the credits. Which is true, there are no garages involved. Just large multinational corporations.
And it’s not as if the funds transfer from the West to the Third world is helping the poor people in the street. The billions of dollars in payments often end up with the financial brokers in London, and with potentially corrupt bureaucrats in China. Interviews with locals near the Xiaoxi dam project suggest people were evicted from their homes, and were not paid enough compensation to buy new homes. The money for the credits associated with the dam was supposed to reduce carbon emissions, yet construction for the Dam started a full two years before the application for CDM funding was even entered. What looks like a Dam, acts like a Dam, but isn’t…?
Bureaucrat-ite may work like a glue plugging holes, but it repels free-markets. Too many bureaucrats and too many rules makes a free market “fixed” in every sense of the word. But the carbon-that-might-have-been-released market can’t be a bureaucrat-free, free-market. It has to be a bureaucrat-rich. The only thing “free” about this market is the price people would pay for carbon-which-might-have-been-released-but-wasn’t.
Click here for FREEDOMINION FORUM RULES
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom; justice; honor; duty; mercy; hope ~ Sir Winston Churchill
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money." Margaret Thatcher They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them, but then an entire life to forget them.
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styky - Member
- Posts: 120244
- Joined: 03/ 10/ 03 9:21 pm
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