[Terrapreta] why we must relate to cap and trade

[Duane Pendergast]

            Morning Lou,

 

Canada has been talking the talk, in depth, on cap and trade for ten years
now. It's been going on so long now governments are just deleting their
analytic reports and discussion from public websites. I recall Europe has
been talking even longer.  Many folks are already advertising offset schemes
and attempting to collect bucks. All this is having essentially no effect on
greenhouse gas emissions. Talk is talk and not worth much, especially in an
election year. Implementation of a real effective scheme is not so easy.

 

Duane

 

-----Original Message-----
From: terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org
[mailto:terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of lou gold
Sent: May 14, 2008 8:00 AM
To: Terrapreta
Subject: [Terrapreta] why we must relate to cap and trade

 


There is a very interesting editorial in today's NY Times 

May 14, 2008

Editorial: The Post-Bush Climate
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/14/opinion/14wed1.html?hp=
<http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/14/opinion/14wed1.html?hp=&pagewanted=print>
&pagewanted=print

It notes that all three US presidential candidates have indicated that they
favor some sort of cap-and-trade system. My guess is that cap-and-trade is
coming. This means than there will soon be a huge pool of monies to support
activities that are viewed as sequestering carbon. 

This is becoming no longer a philosophical or ideological or moral matter.
It is happening and many folks (the good, the bad, the etc) are positioning
themselves to bargain for the offset bucks. 

I believe that this is why we are suddenly seeing foolish proposals like
growing and burying trees. Why? Because growing and burying trees has some
concrete metrics associated with it. There is measurable carbon retrieval.
There is measurable organic carbon to be buried (or perhaps sunk into oceans
where big logs don't deteriorate). The point is that the discussion is
shifting to metrics and the biochar movement better have some way to measure
its benefits if it hopes to compete.

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