A United Nations scheme to promote carbon-reducing power projects in poor countries has come under threat as Europe tightens the rules governing the trade in carbon permits in the European Union's Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).
Brussels has threatened to limit severely the trade in Certified Emission Reduction credits (CERs) after 2012 if the world fails to agree a successor treaty to the Kyoto Protocol and one that creates a wider market for carbon.
The latest US-led climate talks in Honolulu, Hawaii, have been described by delegates as the most frank and engaging climate negotiations so far.
It was the second in a series of Major Economies Meetings called by US President George W Bush.
Today the Financial Times reports on the poor performance of the Renewables Obligation in encouraging wind farms: "The amount of new wind capacity added in 2007 was less than three-quarters of that built the year before." This is despite subsidies that make wind farms massively profitable.
Simon Linnett's plan, written for the Social Market Foundation, for a global response to the threat of anthropogenic global warming (PDF) is entirely misconceived. At each stage it chooses the worst possible path forward from its analysis of the threat, to the manner of the response, to the scale at which it is organised.
President George W. Bush did not come out in favor of cap-and-trade legislation in his State of the Union address to Congress on Monday night, nor did he say whether the EPA would find that carbon dioxide emissions endanger public health or welfare and therefore must be regulated under the Clean Air Act or whether Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne would decide to list the polar bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. The president did say that the U. S. should, “complete an international agreement that has the potential to slow, stop and eventually reverse the growth of greenhouse gases.” He then added that, “This agreement will be effective only if it includes commitments by every major economy and gives none a free ride.”
The way I read this is that Bush is relying on China and India to save us from the stupid and colossally expensive policies that would be needed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Hiding behind China and India will probably work, but it would be much better for the U. S., as the world’s leading developing economy, to lead the developing countries against the policies of economic decline being pushed by the European Union. The Bush Administration should be making the moral case against putting the world on an energy starvation diet.
The Director of the Fish and Wildlife Service, Dale Hall, testified before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on Wednesday on the proposed listing of the polar bear under ESA. The rumors from the Interior Department are that Hall, Secretary Kempthorne, and Under Secretary Lynn Scarlett are pushing for the listing against the scientific evidence presented by FWS field biologists. The ESA requires that a listing be based on the “best available scientific data”. Since most of the Arctic’s 19 bear populations have been increasing, the data suggests that the bear is not threatened. But computer models suggest that global warming will threaten the bear in the future. To my mind, computer models do not provide the best available scientific data. In fact, their speculative conclusions do not meet the minimal demands of the Federal Data Quality Act.
Although Hall may be pushing for the listing, he made some sensible comments at the hearing. He said that listing under the ESA will do little more to protect the polar bear than is already being done under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. And he said that he didn’t think using the ESA was the right regulatory tool to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. So perhaps the decision hasn’t yet been made to list the bear. As always, the most sensible remarks at the hearing were made by Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla.), the committee’s ranking Republican.
C. Boyden Gray, the U.S. Envoy to the European Union, said Tuesday (Jan. 28) that U.S. and EU adoption of carbon “offset” taxes (aka carbon tariffs) is “inevitable” if China, India, and other developing countries refuse to limit their greenhouse gas emissions.
Gray spoke to European-based reporters in a telephone news conference. As reported by Joe Kirwin of BNA (Bureau of National Affairs, Inc.), Gray said the United States and the EU would “have no choice” but to impose carbon tariffs on products from developing countries to remain competitive in the global economy. To illustrate, he cited the import penalty provisions of S. 2191, the climate bill introduced by Sens. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) and John Warner (R-Va.).
Such talk can only encourage European countries, which are considering a carbon tariff proposal put forward by the European Commission, to restrict trade and impede development in poor countries.
It is unclear whether Mr. Gray was speaking for the Bush Administration or just giving his own opinion. Only two weeks ago (January 17), U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab warned that “attempting to force others to act on climate change through trade saber-rattling carries enormous risks.” She characterized measures like Lieberman-Warner as “threats to the global trading system—a system that has delivered prosperity to billions around the world.”
The United States—for very good reasons—declined to ratify the Kyoto treaty. U.S. officials can’t go around calling for carbon tariffs on products from China and India without building a case for the EU and Japan to slap carbon penalties on U.S.-made goods.
Two things have become painfully obvious. First, Kyoto cannot actually reduce global emissions—much less stabilize atmospheric CO2 levels—unless China, India, and other key developing countries also limit their emissions. Second, the developing country exemption creates strong incentives for energy-intensive industry, jobs, and carbon emissions to migrate from carbon-constrained countries to China, India, and other emerging industrial powerhouses.
Much of the power of the Web lies in speed and reach. But those same properties are the source of its greatest failing as well: the tendency to spread faulty assertions instantly and widely. Maybe it’s time for a “slow blog” movement, just as there’s now a slow food movement — and even a slow life movement, as described in The Times this week.
Steel maker ArcelorMittal has reached an agreement on CO2 quotas at its Liege plant and promised to restart its blast furnace on the condition of the granting of a 'polluter's permit', Agence France-Presse reported, citing Belgian government sources.
AT THE big Sandton mall in northern Johannesburg, idle shoppers stroll in darkness. They have been caught in one of the many blackouts that have plagued South Africa for three weeks. Shops are closed, unable to open their tills or process credit cards. Ice-cream shops watch their merchandise dissolve; food stalls are unable to offer coffee or anything hot to eat. In Cape Town a power cut trapped tourists in the cable car that goes up Table Mountain, and in Pretoria angry commuters whose trains stopped running set them on fire. In Johannesburg, which is congested at the best of times, the roads become gridlocked when the traffic lights go out.
Most shocking of all, the country's largest gold, platinum, coal and diamond producers shut down their underground mines on January 25th, after being told that their electricity supply could not be guaranteed. Five days later, having been promised a stable supply, they resumed production. But they will have to limit their power consumption to 90% of the usual level. On January 29th the authorities said power cuts and rationing would continue until July.
The impact is also felt beyond South Africa's borders. Eskom is rationing the electricity it exports to Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Swaziland. The interruption of mining has pushed up the prices of gold and platinum. The crisis is likely to affect global platinum markets, where supply has been tight for a few years, particularly: South Africa produces over 75% of the world's supply. Carmakers, which buy over half of global platinum production for use in catalytic converters, must be praying South Africa will soon emerge from the darkness.
Indonesia is a land in turmoil, home to massive volcanoes, tsunamis, and earthquakes. On Monday, January 14, it experienced a brand new type of disturbance, the world's first food riot caused by another nation pandering to the global warming mob. Indonesians took to the streets, demanding that their government to do something about the price of soybeans, a dietary staple.
All over the world, food prices are on the rise. For most of the late 1990s and up until 2005, the price of beans on the Chicago Board of Trade had remained stable at about $5 a bushel. Since then, they have shot up over 150 percent, to around $13. Corn has doubled, to $5. Wheat prices have tripled.
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