The California Air Resources Board (CARB) announced last week that California’s cap-and-trade program will be linked to Québec’s cap-and-trade scheme.

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Last week the South Korean National Assembly passed legislation to start a cap-and-trade system by 2015 to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase renewable energy.

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Can an energy company like Shell lead on environmental issues, community building and climate change? Read Shell’s 2011 sustainability report and decide for yourself.

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On Friday, Mexico’s House of Representatives passed a new piece of climate change legislation, making it only the second country in the world behind the UK and its Climate Change Act to do so, once it is approved by Mexico’s Senate. The law calls for reducing carbon emissions by 50 percent by 2050.

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Picture a group of really tall basketball players, playing keep-away with a group of small children. They laugh and joke as they toss the ball back and forth over the outstretched arms of the frustrated little ones. Remind you of anything?

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Were the celebrations too early? Earlier this week, I reported on the launch of the new European scheme requiring airlines to pay for the carbon emissions of their flights to and from Europe. As I mentioned, most of the world was pretty angry with the scheme and many countries protested and promised to take an [...]

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One way to price natural services (when a market for those services don’t already exist) is to use a technique called Contingent Valuation, but it has its limitations

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The Northeast’s Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) will yield an economic gain of $1.6 billion, create 16,000 jobs and save consumers across its ten participating member states some $1.1 billion in electricity, heating and cooling bills over the next ten years as a result of its first three years in operation, according to an economic consulting firm’s report.

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A report released earlier this week by The Analysis Group, entitled “The Economic Impacts of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative on Ten Northeast and Mid-Atlantic States,” tracked the dollars collected and spent by the program over its first three years of existence. The report finds that the program, despite continuous criticism from conservatives as being burdensome and costly, added a net value of $1.6 billion, to the ten member states, or roughly, $33 per person.

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The California Air Resources Board (CARB) finalized the rules for the golden state’s cap-and-trade program last week. The cap-and-trade program is part of California’s climate change law (AB 32) which mandates greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) be reduced to 1990 levels by 2020. The program covers 360 businesses representing 600 facilities, and will be implemented in [...]

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This post has been entered in TckTckTck’s contest to sent a blogger to cover Rio+20. If you like what you see, give it a Facebook Like and head over to TckTckTck’s Facebook page to give it a like there as well. You heard that right. Some years back, Vestergaard Frandsen, a company operating under a Humanitarian [...]

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The controversial European Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) – a European wide cap and trade program – has sparked an ongoing dispute between the US and Europe regarding mandatory inclusion of non-European based airlines into the program. In August, the potential for a trade war seemed possible due to mounting opposition both in the USA as [...]

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Boyd Cohen, Co-author, Climate Capitalism Many public policy gurus and economists will tell you that if we truly want to decarbonize our economy we need to actually put a price on carbon.  Just last week I conducted a book launch for Climate Capitalism in Portland with the support of Sustainable Business Oregon, Net Impact and [...]

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It’s never boring with Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) around. I’m sure both fans and non-fans of the Republican presidential candidate would agree. One thing they might not agree on so much is her integrity. Critics especially like to point out major differences between the record of Representative Bachmann and the rhetoric of candidate Bachmann when [...]

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In June, I wrote about whether the US was right to seek an exemption from the European Union’s Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS) for US airlines. The cap-and-trade scheme, designed to curb CO2 emissions, is being vigorously opposed by the American Air Transport Association, and a month on, it seems things are no less fractious, [...]

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Businesses beg for definitive rulings on issues such as carbon pricing and environmental social governance (ESG) reporting requirements, meanwhile the legislature clamors (successfully) “drill baby drill” and accuses environmentalists of favoring spotted owls over jobs. Our leaders’ attitude seems to be climate change has to wait until the economy has turned around.

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A “carbon” bubble exists and massive misallocation of capital is taking place in world financial markets as fossil fuel reserves and the shares of coal, oil and natural gas producers continue to be valued as if we can continue to burn as much fossil fuel as we want.

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Business Green reports that US Airlines, American Airlines, Continental and United, along with their trade association, the Air Transport Association (ATA), will file a legal challenge to a European law requiring all airlines flying into and out of the EU to pay a charge per tonne of CO2 emitted. The US government opposes the law. [...]

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With California’s robust program for AB 32 set to launch in 2012, its cap-and-trade component has recently been a source of litigation, political posturing, and in many cases, misperceptions.    Triple Pundit Guest Authors Jeff Cohen and Alex Rau tackle these misperceptions. Drawing on success of the Federal acid rain program, and echoing recent advocacy by business leaders and the Clean Economy Network, the authors make the case for cap-and-trade in California.

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California CEOs and business leaders sent a letter to Governor Jerry Brown urging him to not revise California’s cap-and-trade system. The California Air Resources Board (CARB) is developing the details of the system, which has come under fire from environmental justice groups. The groups went as far as filing a lawsuit to stop CARB from [...]

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New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) announced that his state is leaving the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a cap-and-trade scheme involving 10 northeastern states. During a press conference, Christie called the RGGI a “failure,” and claimed it is “not effective in reducing greenhouse gases and is unlikely to be in the future.” He described [...]

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By: David Delasanta Chesapeake Bay – Current Situation The Chesapeake Bay is in a deplorable state. The waters of the 64,000 square-mile watershed, which covers parts of New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, Delaware, Maryland and Washington DC, have been deteriorating for decades due to water and air pollution. One of the most pronounced pollution [...]

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Under the Bush Administration, greenhouse gases were not considered pollutants. The question was settled in a Supreme Court case in 2007, and whether you agree or not, it is settled law. Now the EPA is enforcing the law. And many denounce this move as a “power grab.”

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Last year, after successfully being vilified as “Cap-and-Tax,” Cap-and-Trade was defeated. Not that I was particularly upset about it. . . After all, cap-and-trade was a very complex solution to an easily rectifiable problem. That doesn’t mean it wouldn’t have worked; a similar scheme to cap sulfur dioxide back in 1990 proved successful… Initiated by [...]

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“The King is dead! Long live the King!” I never really understood what that phrase meant – until now. Supporters of carbon markets witnessed the death of any potential for a climate bill in the US, at least until after the 2012 election. The Chicago Climate Exchange, a voluntary emissions exchange platform built as the [...]

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Sir Richard Branson, the brash, suave, billionaire adventurer has suggested that a carbon tax can stave off a global climate crisis, as long as it is systemically and equitably implemented. In Cancún for the UN climate talks, Branson suggested that businesses and entrepreneurs could reach emission reduction goals if world governments were unable to reach [...]

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By: David A. Bainbridge Failed states are growing in number–Somalia, the Congo, Afghanistan, Iceland, Greece, Ireland, and California? If California can’t eliminate its structural deficit and get expenditures and revenues to match, the future is likely to be very grim. Governor-elect Brown faces an enormous challenge – but brings a breadth of experience and wisdom [...]

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The Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX), the U.S.’s only emissions credit exchange, will close shop by year’s end, citing a lack of legislative interest. While voluntary, the exchange was legally binding, and counted among its members Dupont, Motorola and IBM. The exchange suffered a blow when it became clear no meaningful climate legislation would make it [...]

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This past Sunday morning, I spoke at a charity brunch in Virginia. The brunch was actually part of a benefit to raise money for a local youth organization that’s working to build an organic garden and greenhouse for low-income families. It wasn’t a big event… No local politicians or big media names. Mostly it was [...]

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With the election of 2010 imminent, all eyes that are looking hopefully in the direction of a sustainable future are turned towards California, where two key propositions are providing the opportunity for Golden State voters to show, once again that when it comes to protecting the environment, California is the conscience of the country, if [...]

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