chlamor
11-06-2009, 05:47 PM
1 Emissions trading doesn't work and won't get us to 350 ppm.
2 The Kyoto Protocol has resulted in a net increase in emissions.
3 Emissions trading has created pollution hotspots.
4 “The economic logic of dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable, and we should face up to it [….] countries in Africa are vastly UNDER polluted” ~ Larry Summers, while serving as Chief Economist of the World Bank. Summers is now Obama's chief economic advisor.
5 Chevron Facility, El Segundo, near Los Angeles) an example of one amongst many facilitates that saw increase in emissions from the S02 market [image]
6 The sulfur dioxide market is often held up as a successful model for the carbon market. What is not told is that it led to pollution hotspots, areas of increased emissions, in majority people-of-color and low-income communities.
7 Unocal Facility, Wilmington (near Long Beach, CA) an example of one amongst many facilitates that saw increase in emissions from the S02 market [image]
8 Carbon trading privatizes the atmosphere, our global commons
9 “Trade in CO2 emissions is equated with the transfer of similar rights such as copyrights, patents, licensing rights and commercial and industrial trademarks.” ~ US Department of Energy
10 "If we put a price on every square inch of air, there are some of us who won't be able to afford to breathe." ~ José Bravo, Just Transition Alliance.
11 Carbon Market Daily - the future of the planet, opaquely marketized [IMAGE]
12 Carbon trading puts corporate profits before reducing emissions
13 "Finally, the legacy of cap-and-trade is not going to be a greener world. It's going to be the world's largest new stock market, trading exclusively in a stock called carbon credits, where the mega-profits will be made by speculators, hedge funds, and the same financial and investment houses that just finished crashing the global economy." -Edmonton Sun
14 RWE, a German power company, got €5 billion in windfall profits in the 2005-07 period, without lowering emissions using carbon markets as an excuse to raise electricity prices despite getting carbon permits for free.
15 The proposed Australian emissions trading scheme will hand $16 billion dollars to big polluting companies.
16 According to the NY Times: "billions of dollars in special interest favors” were added to the ACES climate bill in order to win enough votes for it to pass the House of Representatives.
17 Trade in the carbon market provides a new source of funding for companies that produce large quantities of greenhouse gasses.
18 Companies can pass the cost of carbon credits onto consumers, allowing them to pollute at the same profit margin.
Reckless, mega-corporations with bad environmental and human rights records support carbon trading...
19 AES Corporation supports carbon trading
20 Alcoa supports carbon trading
21 Alstom supports carbon trading
22 Boston Scientific Corporation supports carbon trading
23 Chrysler supports carbon trading
24 Duke Energy supports carbon trading
25 Dupont supports carbon trading
26 Exelon supports carbon trading
27 Florida Power and Light supports carbon trading
28 Ford supports carbon trading
29 General Electric supports carbon trading
30 General Motors supports carbon trading
31 John Deere supports carbon trading
32 Johnson and Johnson supports carbon trading
33 NRG supports carbon trading
34 Pepsi supports carbon trading
35 PG&E supports carbon trading
36 PNM Resources supports carbon trading
37 BP supports carbon trading
38 Caterpillar supports carbon trading
39 ConocoPhillips supports carbon trading
40 Dow Chemical supports carbon trading
41 Rio Tinto supports carbon trading
42 Shell Oil supports carbon trading
43 Siemens supports carbon trading
(American International Group (AIG) and Lehman Brothers supported carbon trading too)
44 It perpetuates rich countries' dominance over poor countries.
45 Carbon markets are fundamentally undemocratic
46 Basic policy decisions (how do we manage waste? protect forests? produce energy?) are moved out of the domain of public decision-making and into private hands by creating a system where private firms become the initiators of projects and policies.
47 Carbon trading encourages change at a glacial pace instead of the rapid transition from fossil fuels that is needed.48 Carbon trading promotes "solutions" which are most profitable, not those which are most protective of the environment or social needs.
49 Carbon trading does nothing to regulate the host of other toxins released in the burning of fossil fuels
50 Carbon markets rely on the price of carbon emissions to act as a regulator, volatility in these prices could have disastrous consequences for the public and the climate.
51 Carbon markets are subject to price volatility, which can result in sharp increases in power bills, hurting utilities customers
52 The ACES bill passed by the US House allows traders to "bank" carbon permits resulting in financial speculation that can create artificial scarcity and push up prices.
53 Carbon markets are like the Whack-a-Mole game; a victory against a proposed dirty coal plant in one location can make it cheaper to build elsewhere.
54 The process is dangerously complex and opaque. It disempowers citizens from being engaged in fighting climate change
55 "The more I look at Congress' legislation to address climate change with a cap-and-trade program, the more it looks like a Rube Goldberg device - one of those amusing contraptions that employ all manner of moving parts in a complicated, convoluted process that performs a simple task.” -Marshall Saunders, Philadelphia Inquirer.
56 Corruptibility breeding comfort: the loopholes and political pork embedded in the carbon trading system have soothed major polluters into broad based support.
57 "Cap and trade...is almost perfectly designed for the buying and selling of political support through the granting of valuable emissions permits to favor specific industries and even specific Congressional districts. That is precisely what is taking place now in the House Energy and Commerce Committee..." - New York Times (05/17/09)
58 Carbon markets hold carbon credits in reserve as a safety valve. If carbon prices get too high, the market is flooded with these reserve credits, preventing any chances of emission reductions.
59 The UN body which approves carbon market transactions is severely under-staffed.
60 Auctioning of carbon credits has rarely happened, nearly all credits have been given away for free
61 "If you didn't auction the permits, it would represent the largest corporate welfare program that has ever been enacted in the history of the United States." Peter Richard Orszag Director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Obama, former Director of the Congressional Budget Office.
62 ACES gives $126 billion in free allowances to heavy industry
63 ACES gives $35 billion in free allowance to carbon capture and storage technologies
64 ACES gives $378 billion in free allowances to electric utilities
65 ACES gives $66 billion in free allowances to natural gas utilities
66 ACES only requires 15% of pollution permits to be sold. The rest are given away.
67 Waxaman-Markey gives $17 billion in free allowances to oil refiners
68 Carbon trading pushes pollution overseas into poorer countries with lower caps
69 It's nearly impossible to prove that most offsets would not have happened anyway without carbon financing.
70 "Carbon Offsets: an imaginary commodity created by deducting what you hope happens from what you guess would have happened." -Dan Welch, writing in Ethical Consumer.
71 A German study reported that 86% of offset-funded projects certified by the UN were likely to have been carried out anyway, not contributing to any additional protection of the climate.
72 Emission reductions units, the currency of the carbon trading system, rarely represent actual emission reductions.
73 Ratings company IDEAcarbon reports that actual emissions reductions from offset projects are 30% less than promised.
74 Offsets encourage the fossil fuel economy instead of restricting it, allowing polluters to carry on polluting.
75 International offsets will drive carbon prices down by 89% under the ACES bill, according to the EPA.
76 The ACES bill gives nearly 5 times more money to polluters than to clean energy companies/organizations.
77 "The ACSE bill would allow the use of up to 2 billion offsets each year, up to three-quarters of them from international sources. The use of these offsets would allow U.S. polluters to boost emissions by nearly two-fifths by 2012 and would not force cutbacks below today's levels until 2027.” -San Francisco Chronicle
78 Australia's proposed carbon trading scheme will do nothing to stop a major expansion of coal mining in New South Wales and other states, despite coal being the major source of Australian (and global) emissions.
79 Australia's proposed carbon trading scheme would permit the expansion of the Mt Piper power station and other coal-fired power stations.
80 The voluntary carbon offset market - which promises consumers "carbon neutrality" - primes the pump for international offset plunder, and perpetuates a consumer guilt paradigm that stifles genuine collective action.
81 Carbon offsets are like the buying of indulgences in the Catholic Church.
82 It makes as much sense as paying a couple to stay faithful to each other so that you can keep cheating on your partner
83 We can't buy our way out of real change.
84 freecarbonoffsets.com - Because no price is too low for feeling good about offsetting responsibility!
85 It encourages the same magical thinking as is putting trash in an landfill and believing it has somehow vanished from the Earth!
86 Many offset projects actively undermine communities living a sustainable, low-carbon lifestyle, promote human rights abuses or encourage environmental racism.
87 Carbon Trading breaches the Treaty of Waitangi, New Zealand's "founding" document between indigenous peoples and colonists signed in 1851.
88 “Farming communities are more threatened now by the so-called solutions to climate change promoted by corporate interests, G8 countries, the World Trade Organization and the World Bank, than by climate change in itself." -Via Campesina
89 "Under the Kyoto Protocol, the Jepirachi wind project received financing as a Clean Devolopment Mechanism to construct a windmill farm in Colombia. The land being developed belongs to the indigenous Wayuu people, who did not want it. Over 200 Wayuu are alleged to have been killed in the ensuing land struggle. To add insult to injury, the windmills primarily provide power to the largest open-pit coal mine in the world!"
90 One of the first carbon offset projects involved planting trees in Mount Elgon National Park, Uganda by Dutch coal utilities. 6000 members of the Bagisu tribe, which lived in the area for centuries, had been forcibly displaced the Park.
91 Plantar is seeking CDM funding to plant 23,130 hectares of land in monoculture eucalyptus plantations in Brazil. Much of this land is publicly owned and used communally by peasants. The tree plantations will expropriate communal lands and put them in private hands.
92 Sajida Khan (1952-2007), famed environmental campaigner of Durban, South Africa, lost her life to cancer while fighting to close the dump, which is a hotbed for illness.
93 The Chinese government evicted 7,500 people to build the Xiaoxi Dam. In the EU this would be illegal, as it fails to meet World Commission on Dams guidelines. Still, EU companies are able to offset their emissions financing this dam.
94 South Africa’s proposed $15 million CDM pilot: Generating methane from electricity at an environmentally-racist Bisasar Road dump, situated in apartheid-era black residential suburb of Durban. This will increase pollution and could keep the facility open for an extra 15 years.
95 Many offsets are straight up scams.
96 A French chemical company (Rhodia) operating in South Korea is anticipating $1 billion in carbon offset credits for investing $15million in equipment to destroy nitrous oxide byproducts, using 1970s technology -Wall St. Journal (05/23/08)
97 South Africa's largest CDM huckster is the coal/gas-to-oil firm SASOL (set up by apartheid to avoid sanctions), a corporation so tempted by the prospect of funding a pipeline it had already built (hence no additionality) that it tried to scam the United Nations CDM panel in 2008.
98 In 2009, Head of the Papua New Guinea Office of Climate Change, Theo Yasause, was removed after fake carbon certificates with his signature valued at $100 million were given to landowners to get them to sign over the rights to their forests.
99 Oil companies in Nigeria are poised to make huge sums of money by selling carbon credits for stopping gas flaring, despite the fact that gas flaring is supposed to be illegal in the first place.
100 SRF, an Indian company that produces refrigeration gases in Rajasthan, made £300 million from selling carbon credits, after spending only £1.4 million on equipment to reduce its emissions. The money earned was used to build more polluting, chemical factories, thus raising emissions.
101 The 2 top offset auditors for the UN have been suspended for repeatedly approving faulty offset projects.
102 Offset money often goes to fossil fuel polluters.
103 Even new coal plants can receive carbon market funding under the CDM, which finances so-called "supercritical technology" at India's coal plants.
104 It will support the construction of one of the world’s top 50 greenhouse gas emitting projects – the $4 billion Tata Ultra Mega coal plants in Mundra, India.
105 “In an absurd contradiction the World Bank facilitates these false, market-based approaches to climate change while at the same time it is promoting, on a far greater scale, the continued exploration for, and extraction and burning of fossil fuels – many of which are to ensure increased emissions of the North.” Marcelo Calazans, Federation of Organizations for Social and Educational Assistance, Brazil
106 Carbon financing justified World Bank funding of the Allain Duhangan hydropower plant in Himachal Pradesh, India - one of the most controversial dam projects in the world.
107 World Bank supported a 3,500 hectare tree plantation in the states of Orissa and Andhra Pradesh, India.
108 Many not-so-clean, sustainable, and "green" things are getting carbon financing - fossil fuel pollution in rich countries, "offset" with environmental destruction in poorer ones.
109 "The reduction targets that are currently under discussion for a post-2012 climate agreement are not strong enough to create a balance between supply and demand, and either forest based carbon credits reduce the price of carbon or, if the sale of forest based credits were restricted, insufficient funds would be generated to make a significant dent in deforestation rates." - Forests and the European Resource Network
110 Carbon markets are encouraging development of genetically engineered tree plantations for carbon sinks.
111 Dams recieve CDM financing despite being a major source of methane emissions. Massive amounts of methane is released as organic matter decomposes under water.
112 It is estimated that 40-80 million people have been displaced by hydroelectric dams. More than a few of these dams were financed via Clean Development Mechanisms.
113 The Grand Inga dam in the Democratic Republic of Congo will destroy a vast natural habitat and aggravate the external debt, while bringing no benefits for local people. Still, it is eligible for CDM financing.
114 REDD, and more broadly, “forest offsets”, are nothing more than an attempt to sweeten “business as usual” environmental practices in developing countries with a few payouts to their governments.
115 "Research is increasingly showing that attributing a price to forest carbon will not be enough to save the forests or protect the climate and may lead to massive land grabs." -FERN (Forests and the European Resource Network)
116 Reuters has reported that organized crime syndicates are eyeing the REDD forest carbon credit industry as a potentially lucrative new opportunity for fraud.
117 With REDD, "Companies would then buy cheap credits and continue doing business as usual rather than cutting their own emissions."- Economist Magazine
118 Carbon takes millions of years to become stored in fossil fuels again. More vegetation is not equal to leaving carbon in the ground.
119 Forest offsets are largely frauds, because it is nearly impossible to accurately calculate the carbon-sequestering abilities of a forest with any degree of certainty.
120 REDD will be almost impossible to verify because of leakage and non-permanence issues.
121 The UNFCCC definition of forests includes plantations (and even clearcuts, which are “temporarily unstocked areas”). Thus a country could create large “temporarily unstocked areas” by clearcutting forests before replacing them with monocultures, without causing any deforestation, according to UNFCCC.
122 REDD frameworks do not recognize indigenous rights and encourage encroachments upon indigenous lands and cultures.
123 "Commodifying forest carbon is inherently inequitable, since it discriminates against people, and especially women, who previously had free access to the forest resources they need to raise and care for their families, but cannot afford to buy forest products or alternatives."
124 REDD compensation payments to governments may create a disincentive for government authorities to resolve long-standing land disputes in forest areas.
125 REDD pilot projects have already exacerbated eviction, fraud, conflict, corruption, coercion, and militarization.
126 Indigenous Peoples could lose their land or other forms of collateral and/or have to reimburse carbon traders with money if a REDD project fails.
127 REDD could cause conflict over resources, forced relocation, and displacement.
128 REDD could criminalize indigenous livelihoods and blame Indigenous Peoples for climate change.
129 REDD could marginalize the landless.
130 REDD could privilege "Carbon Rights" over Human Rights.
131 REDD could repeat the mistakes of CDM projects and encourage projects in areas of armed conflict.
132 REDD would be a failure for Indigenous Rights: A tribal representative in Papua New Guinea told newspaper Sydney Morning Herald he had been coerced into signing a memorandum of understanding that gave company Nupan power over his land, saying, 'I couldn't do anything … So I just went ahead and signed it.''
133 The UNEP-funded Mau forest project in Kenya has added yet another case to the list of carbon offset projects triggering serious human rights violations: the Mau forest was made ‘ready’ for this carbon offset project by forceful and often violent eviction of its inhabitants, including the Indigenous Ogiek People.
134 Industrial-scale trash burning is one of the fastest-growing energy sources being marketed as “green energy”.
135 By capturing methane and using it as fuel to produce electricity, landfill owners in the US can receive an income for selling carbon credits in the voluntary market. The investment pays off by itself, so carbon credits revenue is a windfall profit.
136 By subsidizing waste disposal, carbon credits encourage increased wasting.
137 The Kerry-Boxer cap and trade bill will provide massive incentives for "biomass" plants, formerly known as waste incinerators.
138 Biomass incinerators burn valuable resources. A good portion of materials used to fuel biomass plants could be recycled or composted.
139 Biomass incinerators produce highly toxic air emissions and solid waste.
140 Waste to energy incinerators emit more CO2 per kWh than do coal plants
141 Biomass incineration is amongst the largest categories of carbon offset projects. Here's some of the worst of the worst:
142 Cixi City, Zhejian Province, China
143 Incineration of municipal solid waste and sewage sludge in Shaoxing City, People’s Republic of China
144 Linyi City, Shandong Province, China
145 Municipal Solid Waste Processing in the city of Chandigarh, India
146 PT Navigat Organic Energy Indonesia Integrated Solid Waste Management (GALFAD) Project in Bali, Indonesia
147 SESL 6 MW Municipal Solid Waste based Power Project Vijaywada & Guntur, India
148 Sidoarjo, Java, Indonesia
149 The Timarpur-Okhla Waste Management Company Pvt Ltd’s project at Delhi, India
150 The UN oversees over 1000 offset programs under the guise of the “Clean Development Mechanism”. Many CDM projects have proven to be total failures.
151 Coal bed methane extraction is the leading benefactor of the voluntary offset market in the US.
152 Coal bed methane extraction is a method by which methane within a coal seam is separated and removed for use as natural gas; through the Clean Development Mechanism 12,799,507 carbon credits have been granted for coal bed methane projects.
153 The average project removes over 6 million gallons of water a year from coal bed aquifers, lowering the water table and often drying wells.
154 The whole scheme subsidizes and promotes the dirtiest fossil fuel out there: Coal!
155 Unaccounted Life Cycle Emissions: Coal bed methane extraction requires extensive infrastructure, including roads, wells, pipelines, containment ponds, and compressor stations.
156 Water quality of the area surrounding the extraction site is threatened by highly saline water that is pumped out of the coal seams as well as the chemicals used to encourage methane out of the coal bed.
157 While preventing methane from entering the atmosphere is a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, CO2 is released when it is burned.
158 “The potential size and scope of a structured carbon emissions market in the U.S. is unequivocally vast. It is certainly possible that the emissions market could overtake all other commodity markets.” Bart Chilton, Commissioner, U.S. Commodities Futures Trading Commission
159 Offsets in the US climate legislation: Because 2 billion tons of offsets are allowed, gross emissions in the US could actually increase by 1/6 over the next 10 years, despite the (meager) 17% reductions on paper.
160 US climate legislation would allow 2 billion tons of carbon offset trading in the US / year - equivalent to 1/3 of all US emissions.
161 Capitalism is at the heart of the climate crisis. We cannot count on it for providing solutions to the problem it has fueled - climate change.
162 "Carbon offsets allow environmental value to be negotiable, when science tells us the exact measures necessary to protect our future."
163 "The profit motive of carbon trading requires growth. Growth spurs unnecessary energy use, which results in more emissions, which cannot be canceled out in the columns of their balance sheets."
164 Carbon trading is based on an ideological belief in the omnipotence of the market.
165 NRG Energy built a 1,700mw coal plant in Texas. The Environmental Defense Fund was against it, but dropped its opposition when NRG agreed to offset half of its emissions.
166 Time after time, privatization has been a disaster in the Global South with services such as water, education and health care. This time, the effects of leaving important things to the market cannot be undone!
167 Carbon trading is a complex, artificially-created market subject to the same failures as the subprime market.
168 "Subprime carbon" are risky carbon credits based on uncompleted offset projects, may ultimately fail to reduce greenhouse gases and, like subprime mortgages, could collapse in value.
169 "The global economic downturn and a growing trade in sovereign emissions rights are combining to create a 'perfect storm' that threatens to derail already sluggish efforts to cut greenhouse gases in poor countries." -Reuters (06/05/09)
170 Subprime carbon can cause more than just an economic collapse. This time, it will be more than homes getting foreclosed on.
171 The entire process is a corporate-driven conflict of interest: Private firms propose the projects and the methodologies to evaluate them. The system is tweaked in favor of private enterprise rather than the public interest, since the system is run by the private sector.
172 The suspension of SGS wasn't the first for carbon market "watchdogs" - Norway’s Det Norske Veritas was penalized in November 2008 for similar infractions.
173 SGS, the world’s largest auditor of clean-energy projects was suspended by United Nations inspectors in September 2009 because it was unable to prove its staff had properly vetted projects that were then approved for the EU's carbon-trading scheme.
174 Anyone remember Enron and Arthur Anderson?
175 Just look at the history of the idea of carbon markets!
176 "Enron immediately embarked on a massive lobbying effort to develop a trading system for carbon dioxide[...]Between 1994 and 1996, the Enron Foundation donated $1-million to [leading carbon trading advocate] the Nature Conservancy [...]Lay and other individuals associated with Enron donated $1.5-million to environmental groups seeking international controls on carbon dioxide.” Financial Post (May 30, 2009)
177 “[I]t is not an exaggeration to brand the mechanisms of the Kyoto Protocol as ‘Made in the USA.’ . . . The sensitivity of the Protocol to the market was largely instigated by the negotiating positions of the USA.” -Michael Zammit Cutajar, former Executive Secretary, UNFCCC, 2004
178 Deals with Devils: The Environmental Defense Fund created the Environmental Resources Trust to promote carbon trading. ERT is chaired by Clayland Boyden Gray, Bush's ambassador to the EU, a longtime opponent of global warming treaties and environmentalists. -nonprofitwatch.org
179 Kyoto “would do more to promote Enron’s business than will almost any other regulatory initiative.” ~ Ken Lay, former CEO of Enron, sent in a 1998 letter to Bill Clinton
180 It encourages a revolving door between NGO's and the energy market, and thus a reliance on energy industry "experts" influenced by the business culture and priorities of the fossil fuel industry.
181 The UN body which approves carbon market transactions relies heavily on third-party verifiers whose wages are ultimately paid by the very corporations seeking approval. This conflict of interest creates pressure for the the transactions to be approved.
182 Carbon trading undermines, replaces and even outlaws other regulations.
183 A leaked government memo in the UK showed that the government was thinking of dropping renewables targets, as they were "interfering" with the carbon market.
184 A simple, non-negotiable cap on emissions would be much more effective.
185 Carbon trading would strip the EPA of its authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.
186 It discourages enactment of new GHG-reducing laws because legally-mandated greenhouse gas reductions are ineligible for financial benefits of the Clean Development Mechanisms.
187 It rewards corporations whose governments lack emissions reduction laws. Companies should not be able to receive funds for emissions reduction while simultaneously lobbying/bribing against GHG regulation.
188 When carbon permits are auctioned, governments often use the income to to aid research and development for status quo fossil fuel polluters as well as subsidizing dubious false solutions
189 The promised expansion of carbon financing keeps the geoengineering industry dreaming about large-scale intentional manipulation of the earth by fertilizing the ocean, shooting sulphates into the stratosphere or putting mirrors in space.
190 When revenue from permit give-a-ways and subsidies to fossil fuel industry research are added together, status quo polluters clearly get about 80% of the income generated from the ACES bill.
191 The bill encourages encourage genetically modified, fossil-fuel-fertilizer-intensive, pesticide-drenched "no-till" farming, instead of organic.
192 In the US House's ACES's bill, almost nothing of the money from the meager 15% of auctions sold goes to "green jobs" - indeed nearly 6x as much goes to subsidizing research into clean coal.
193 It promotes "clean" coal by providing incentives for carbon capture and sequestration technology. Even if CCS worked, it ignores the devastating impacts coal has from cradle to grave.
194 Carbon trading promotes the expansion of biofuels. Biofuels rarely reduce carbon emissions, result in deforestation, and prioritize feeding machines instead of people.
195 Ethanol plants pollute water. They generate 13 liters of wastewater for every liter of ethanol produced.
196 Bio-diesel from palm oil has led to increased planting in clear cut areas. This reduces the amount of carbon tied up in biomass, which means a net increase in atmospheric CO2.
197 Biofuel crops could also put an unbearable strain on the global water supply: Replacing 50 percent of the fossil fuels with biofuels would require up to 12,000 extra cubic kilometers of water a year (the total annual flow down the world's rivers is 14,000 cubic kilometers).
198 Converting rainforests, peatlands, savannahs or grasslands to grow fuel crops releases CO2, in some cases a staggering 420 times more CO2 than from burning fossil fuel.
199 Ethanol is directly linked to the Gulf of Mexico dead zone. If farmers produced enough corn to meet the congressional goal of producing 15 billion gallons of ethanol by 2022, nitrogen runoff into the Gulf would increase by 10% to 19%.
200 Growing plants for fuel will accelerate the already unacceptable levels of topsoil erosion, soil carbon and nutrient depletion, soil compaction, water retention, water depletion, water pollution, air pollution, eutrophication, destruction of fisheries, siltation of dams and waterways, salination, loss of biodiversity, and damage to human health.
201 The biofuels craze could starve people: The surge in ethanol production will translate into higher prices for both processed and staple foods around the world.
202 The expansion of palm oil production is one of the leading causes of rainforest destruction in south-east Asia.
203 The high-volume agriculture needed to support significant use of biofuels will favor industrial-style high-volume, high-capital, low-labor agriculture that will force more people off farms and out of small villages into mega-cities.
204 Using fertilizer on biofuel crops will be emitting enough nitrous oxide (more than 296 times more powerful heat trapping gas than CO2) to 'wipe out all the carbon savings biofuels produce.
205 Carbon trading promotes the use of nuclear energy as a no-emission technology. Which it's not.
206 Demand would greatly outstrip supply--In fact, the current global capability is 8 reactors per year.
207 Nukes are too expensive--Nuclear power is now so expensive that if we tried to use it as a climate mitigation strategy, we would blow through our resources and be left with no options whatsoever.
208 " New nukes take too long--Even the industry’s Nuclear
Energy Institute predicts only about 4 new reactors in the US by 2020"
209 Renewables and efficiency are faster, cheaper, safer and cleaner than nuclear power--In short, energy efficiency programs are beginning to work.
210 "Exelon, the nation's largest nuclear power company, stands to rake in roughly an extra $1 billion to $1.5 billion a year if the House (cap and trade) climate change bill passes, according to the company's own estimates.” -Huffington Post
211 Emissions free? Not even close-- Every nuclear facility of any kind, emits radioactive elements into our air and water on a daily basis, even when everything goes right."
212 It takes too many nukes-- It would take 1500-2,000 new nuclear reactors or more by mid-century, 300-400 in the U.S. alone, to make any kind of meaningful reduction in carbon emissions—by meaningful, I mean even a 20% reduction.
213 Not suited for warming climates--Reactors require large amounts of water for cooling. As climate change heats our water, nuclear power stations will close more and more frequently. Several nuke plants have already had to shutdown during unprecedented heat waves.
214 Nukes are unsafe--The reality is that reactor design—at least for those planned by nuclear utilities—has progressed remarkably little since the 1960s. But not a single reactor being seriously proposed anywhere in the world even claims to be an ""inherently safe"" design—not that any such thing exists at all.
215 Nukes aren't carbon free--It’s true that nuclear reactors themselves emit only small amounts of carbon. In fact, the mining, milling, processing, enrichment and fuel fabrication of uranium, not to mention the construction of enormous reactors made of concrete, steel, and the millions of gallons of gasoline involved, leaves a fairly significant carbon footprint.
216 The Department of Energy states there are "millions of gallons of radioactive waste" as well as "thousands of tons of spent nuclear fuel and material" and also "huge quantities of contaminated soil and water." And yet there is still no permanent place to store it in the US.
217 - 259 Under the proposed ACES carbon trading bill in the United States ("ACES bill"), 43 proposed coal plants will be grandfathered in as a compromise to the big polluters who largely drafted the bill. These new plants will add more than 150 MILLION tons of C02 to the atmosphere every year for decades to come, and continue our addiction to fossil fuels.
260 Coal mining in Happy Valley, on New Zealand's South Island, is set to proceed despite their Kyoto commitments - a massive climate crime.
261 In order to pass a carbon trading bill in the United States, experts expect that negotiating a "deal with the devil" to allow Offshore Drilling will be required.
262 Due to it's lower C02 content, natural gas use is increasing rather than decreasing under carbon trading. But by ignoring the lifecycle impacts of natural gas, carbon trading wreaks havoc on communities worldwide and continues our reliance on fossil fuels.
263 LNG has lifecycle emissions approaching that of coal.
264 The importation emissions of LNG aren't considered as part of the cap - so LNG gets a free ride and is strongly encouraged by carbon trading.
265 There are 29 approved or proposed "liquified" natural gas (LNG) importation terminals planned in the US.
266 Agricultural industries aren't included in the emissions cap under the ACES bill, even though they are responsible for 8% of greenhouse gas emissions in the US.
267 "Carbon trading largely fail to address the largest single energy consumer in the world, the US Department of Defense - upward estimates put oil use by the DoD as high as the country
of Indonesia (population 235 million)."
268 There are alternative policies.
269 “Ladies and gentlemen, I have the answer! Incredible as it might seem, I have stumbled across the single technology which will save us from runaway climate change! From the goodness of my heart I offer it to you for free. No patents, no small print, no hidden clauses. Already this technology, a radical new kind of carbon capture and storage, is causing a stir among scientists. It is cheap, it is efficient and it can be deployed straightaway. It is called... leaving fossil fuels in the ground.” George Monbiot, Columnist with the Guardian UK"
270 A Clean Energy Portfolio Standard that meets the demands of the other 50% with wind, solar and ocean power (some small-scale micro hydro or closed-loop geothermal) within the same time frame.
271 An Energy Efficiency Portfolio Standard that reduces energy demand by 50% in 20-30 years, across transportation, heating and electricity.
272 Creating a "Superfund for Workers" job retraining program to make this transition possible, targeting the urban and rural communities who are most in need.
273 Implement a zero-cut policy on our National Forests to keep forest carbon intact.
274 Remove all subsidies from fossil fuels, nuclear power, biomass/incineration, biofuels, and at least half of the military budget and shift that to energy demand reduction and clean energy
275 Set a national zero waste policy, starting with the 75% national recycling/composting (a goal endorsed by unions as well as climate activists).
276 Shift subsidies from industrial agri-business to locally oriented sustainable food systems
277 The Rodale Institute has found that if all corn and soybeans in the US were grown organically up to 560 billion pounds of carbon could be sequestered annually from the atmosphere.
278 The USDA can promote agricultural practices that sequester carbon into the soil, creating carbon sinks not tied to offsets.
279 Use the millions of dollars the Forest Service spends to subsidize logging to fund real ecosystem restoration, creating carbon sinks not tied to offsets.
280 Grassroots alternatives provide solutions that nurture communities not corporations
281 Local currencies and time banks re-localize economics and create a system of exchange based on community and mutual aid rather than unsustainable consumption and social inequality.
282 Organizing skill-shares and sharing tools and other resources can help build community self-sufficiency.
283 "Bike culture" - community rides, car-free days, maintenance skill building, and bike sharing programs have created community-based alternatives to automobile-domination in cities worldwide.
284 Cohousing, resident-developed neighborhoods centered around a common house, dramatically reduces resource consumption while building a new model of social interaction.
285 Permaculture - a method of agriculture and community design that uses a model based on natural ecosystems to relocalize and integrate sustainable food production into human settlements.
286 Reduce our consumption of meat. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization found that meat production is responsible for 18% of all human induced greenhouse gases.
287 Support for struggles of resistance to resource colonialism, from Appalachia to Iraq, supports the creation of alternatives by taking on the government and business interests fueling climate change.
288 Transition Towns, of which there are currently 227 official initiatives, are attempts to address climate change and peak oil by increasing resilience and reducing carbon emissions as a community.
289 Direct resistance to fossil fuels correctly identifies the root cause of climate chaos.
290 Anti-natural gas imperialism in Bolivia [image]
291 Protesting the Asian Development Bank's role in dirty energy development in Thailand [image]
292 Protesting coal in Bangladesh [image]
293 Anti-coal billboard alteration in Australia [image]
294 Coal port kayak blockade in Australia [image]
295 Protesting natural gas expansion in Irkutsk [image]
296 Anti mountain top removal coal mining in Appalachia US [image]
297 Rising Tide Coal plant blockade in Appalachia US [image]
298 Airport shut down in the UK [image]
299 Ken Saro-Wiwa was martyred fighting big oil in Nigeria [image]
300 Indigenous resistance to coal in the US southwest [image]
301 Anti-oil resistance in Thailand [image]
302 Blockading natural gas expansion in the US [image]
303 The oil enforcement agency fighting highway expansion. [image]
304 Opposition to Carbon Trading is mounting.
305 “The only defense of this monstrous absurdity that I have heard is 'well, you are right, it’s no good, but the train has left the station.' If the train has left, it had better be derailed soon or the planet, and all of us, will be in deep do-do."" ~ Dr. James Hansen, head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Regarded as one of a handful of top global experts on climate change and the scientist most responsible for the development of the 350ppm target."
306 “If we hold up banners saying climate change kills and we want more government action, the very power groups driving the destruction will cheer and might give us even more carbon finance or agrofuels. The time for marching for ‘global action on climate change’ without denouncing the false solutions and the drivers of climate change is over.” -Simone Lovera, activist with Friends of the Earth Paraguay and the Global Forest Coalition
307 Art exposing the carbon market fraud. [image]
308 Cap'n Trade interrupting the speech of the danish climate minister. [image]
309 Indigenous resistance to REDD at the UN. [image]
310 Taking action against crony environmental groups like Environmental Defense. [image]
311 Anti offset office occupation by the red herrings for carbon trading [image]
312 Sweeping the coal under the rug at the Carbon Neutral Company, UK [image]
313 Interrupting the first US carbon market conference with a presentation of a Deed to the Sky [image]
314 Speaking truth to power at the UNFCCC [image]
315 Anti-carbon trading banner hang targets the New York city UN meetings. [image]
316 Dancing against forest offsets in Bali [image]
317 Protesting research on genetically engineered carbon sucking trees. [image]
318 Protests drove Occidental Petroleum was driven out of Ecuador
319 All women anti- liquefied natural gas action in US [image]
Twenty Nine declarations of social movements against carbon trading:
320 Mount Tamalpais Declaration, 2000
321 Mount Kenya Declaration on the Global Crisis and Africa’s Responsibility 31 May 2009
322 IV Continental Summit Indigenous peoples Abya Yala:: Mama Quta Titikaka Declaration 31 May 2009
323 Bali Declaration: 10 December 2007
324 People’s Protocol on Climate Change, 15 December 2008
325 Report of Asia Summit on Climate Change and Indigenous Peoples , 5 June 2009
326 14th Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC Poznan Policy Positions International Youth Delegation Policy Positions: December 2008
327 World Social Forum Climate Justice Assembly Declaration 1 February 2009 Belem
328 Milan Declaration of the 6th International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change 30 November 2003
329 Hague Declaration of the Second International Forum of Indigenous and Local Communities on Climate Change 12 November 2000
330 The Durban Declaration on Carbon Trading , 10 October 2004
331 Biochar Declaration 2009 :‘Biochar’, a new big threat to people, land, and ecosystems
332 Nairobi Declaration, Africa Peoples Movement on Climate Change (A-PMCC) 30 August 2009
333 The California Environmental Justice Movement’s Declaration Against the Use of Carbon Trading Schemes to Address Climate Change, 19 February 2008
334 Bali Principles of Climate Justice 29 August 2002
335 Quito Declaration 4 May 2000
336 Plataforma Boliviana Frente al Cambio Climático INTERNATIONAL CLIMATE JUSTICE TRIBUNAL 14 October 2009
337 The better world we seek is not Geo-engineered! A Civil Society Statement against Ocean Fertilization. 10 March 2009
338 Declaration of Women in Asia on Climate Change 29 September 2009
339 Indigenous Environmental Network Report Calls For The Rejection Of REDD 02 October 2009
340 Delhi Climate Justice Declaration 1 Nov 2002
341 he Anchorage Declaration 24 April 2009 - Indigenous People's Global Summit on Climate Change
342 The Albuquerque Declaration November 1, 1998
343 Oilwatch POSITION ON VOLUNTARY CARBON MARKET 2008
344 CONFEDERACION DE NACIONALIDADES INDIGENAS DE LA AMAZONIA ECUATORIANA “C O N F E N I A E” 3 August 2009
345 Lyon Declaration of the First International Forum of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities on Climate Change 6 September 2000
346 The Bonn Declaration Third International Forum of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities on Climate Change July 14 15, 2001
347 INTERNATIONAL INDIAN TREATY COUNCIL 34th ANNUAL CONFERENCE, Resolution on the Protection of the Environment and biodiversity: Climate Change, Mining, Oil, Water and Natural Resources 22 June 2008
348 Via Campesina position on UNFCCC 5 December 2008
349 Because you care about your children and their children.
350 Because nearly 100 people, from 6 continents and 13 countries, cared enough about the climate and human rights to volunteer time and contribute reasons to make this project possible: HUGE Thanks to everyone!
http://www.350reasons.org/350_reasons_list.html
chlamor
08-25-2010, 12:42 PM
Poorer Nations Hit with 'Exorbitant' Consultancy Fees for Carbon Offset Projects
by Reese Erlich in Badreni, Nepal
The UN-certified scheme that allows developed nations to pay for carbon reductions abroad instead of making domestic cuts has come under fire for paying high fees to consultants from rich countries.
[A woman sits on her land near the river. The Nepalese government subsidises farmers to install equipment that turns animal and human waste into methane cooking fuel, using less firewood. (Photograph: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian)]A woman sits on her land near the river. The Nepalese government subsidises farmers to install equipment that turns animal and human waste into methane cooking fuel, using less firewood. (Photograph: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian)
The Guardian has learned that the Nepalese government has so far paid a Norwegian company €150,000 to verify a greenhouse gas reduction programme for which it is seeking carbon credits. That sum would pay for 340 of the small-scale carbon cutting projects the government is trying to set up.
Seperately, the conservation charity WWF pays €20,000 (£16,000) per verification visit for a smaller project using the same technology, but under a different scheme.
Kyle Ash, a Greenpeace official in Washington DC called the fees "exorbitant" and questioned the entire UN-administered cap and trade system. "It doesn't seem like a good investment especially when there are other ways to reduce emissions," he said.
"We need to restrict global warming pollution [in industrialised countries]," he said. "And we need to finance clean development in third world countries. But the two things aren't connected."
Stein Jensen, a spokesman for the Oslo-based consulting company used by the Nepalese government, Det Norske Veritas (DNV), said that there is such competition to provide consultancy services that the fees reflect the market rate. He added: "for small projects the transaction costs are high."
The UN says verification is necessary to ensure that schemes attracting carbon credits really do lead to reductions in CO2, but it has currently approved only 33 companies worldwide to evaluate carbon offset projects.
Samir Thapa, an official with the Nepalese government's Alternative Energy Promotion Centre, said the demand for evaluators outstrips the number of companies available. "You may have to wait to validate your project for six months or one year," he said. "Economically, that's not very viable for the project, especially in terms of smaller projects like ours."
The Nepalese government has been working since 2006 to receive UN certification to sell carbon offsets for two biogas projects. The government subsidises farmers to install equipment that turns animal and human waste into methane cooking fuel. Under the scheme, local people will use less firewood and other fuels, thereby reducing carbon emissions.
The government paid DNV €150,000 (£123,000) for initial site visits and related services. It will have to pay €50,000 (£41,000) for subsequent annual visits. Nepal hopes to complete the UN-administered certification process by the end of this year and ultimately wants to build 200,000 biogas installations. It expects to earn $400,000 (£259,000) per year in carbon credits.
The biogas equipment currently costs $575 (£372) per household, a significant sum for farmers earning under $1,500 (£971) per year. The government offers partial subsidies, but farmers must spend some of their savings and take out microcredit loans to pay for the rest.
Villager Sabitri Dairi said the scheme had brought environmental benefits. "It's harmful to the forest and the environment to cut firewood down. There could be landslides and floods."
WWF helped finance the biogas for people in Badreni, a village in the south of the country near Chitwan national park. In a project separate from the Nepalese government's, WWF hopes to raise $1m for a microcredit fund by participating in the voluntary carbon offset market. Voluntary credits are not recognised by the UN as meeting a country's carbon reduction goals under the Kyoto protocol. But participants such as WWF must go through a similar validation and verification process as those who do.
WWF will get credit for each tonne of carbon not produced as a result of using biogas. It sells the credits to the Zurich-based NGO Myclimate, which in turn provides offsets to individuals, airlines and other European companies seeking to reduce their carbon footprints.
Thomas Finsterwald, project manager with Myclimate, admitted that the high fees make "it difficult to do small projects." He said inspection fees might eat up 40% of income for some other projects. "This is really a problem."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/08/25-7#comment-1595096
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