Climate Greenwash: Vattenfall win

On arriving in Copenhagen, I went straight to the Climate Greenwash Awards ceremony. Swedish energy company Vattenfall won, with 39 per cent of the votes. The company was nominated for “its mastery of spin on climate change, portraying itself as a climate champion while lobbying to continue business as usual, using coal, nuclear power, and pseudo-solutions such as agrofuels and carbon capture and storage (CCS).”

A special award also went to the Danish government, for its role in helping establish the World Business Summit on Climate Change, which starts today.

Someone had the bright idea to serve "greenwash" as a drink - good concept, but it tasted like mouthwash with alcohol added to it.

UN Climate Negotiations: analysis of latest positions

The US has played its hand, finally, if rather tentatively in the negotiations leading to a new UN climate treaty to be signed in Copenhagen this December. You can find them, with a range of other submissions, on the UNFCCC website. In fact, the US position remains thin on detail - other than to reiterate Obama´s previous statement that the US will reduce emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. To put this in some context, the Clinton administration had agreed to a 7% reduction on 1990 levels by 2012 - before renaging on its promise. The cost extracted for this "generous" concession to binding targets at the time was a system of carbon offsetting, put on the table by Al Gore (the chief negotiator at Kyoto) that still plagues the talks today.

The EU and sectoral carbon markets
There is some admission that these offsets are not working. The European Commission, in particular, now claims that it wants to see "substantial reform" of the Clean Development Mechanism, the controversial system that allows credits from a serious of dubious corporate projects in the global South to be treated as equivalent to "reductions" in industrialised countries.

The EU acknowledges the failings of this system, but its actual proposals for reform currently take the worst aspects of the scheme and exacerbate them. In particular, it advances a proposal for sectoral carbon markets, which is presented as a move away from controversial offset projects. Yet these proposals for ´sectoral crediting´ are being made within the framework of the Clean Development Mechanism, and have the potential to massively increase its scope. At the same time, they would lower the already inadequate checks on environmental sustainability and social justice, bypassing the current requirement to assess each project individually. This has been the dream of dodgy offset developers the world over.

The EU is proposing that CDM offset credits can be generated by any practice that alters ´business-as-usual trends´ in particular sectors - but this is not the same as a reduction. In most sectors, for example, the trend since 1990 (the usual baseline) has involved enormous increases, while the recent growth trends are slower. Depending on the baseline that is chosen, a baseline target could allow for continued increases over and above those that are currently being witnessed.

Another problem is that the existing data is often extremely poor - which means that assessments of business-as-usual are in the hands of the companies active in those sectors themselves. There is a clear incentive here for companies to talk up current emissions levels, in order to then maximise the number of carbon credits they would receive as a result. The over-allocation in the first phase of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme is a clear precedent for just such a practice.

The EU is proposing a separate "sectoral trading" scheme alongside this sectoral crediting - which is as confusing a mess as that sounds. One of the major failings of carbon trading has been this mix-and-match approach, where a finite "cap" is set with one hand, only for that to be lifted with the other hand by "offsets" that increase undermine it.

Since these credits can be sold on an international market, there is a very serious change they would further undermine the integrity of the EU ETS as well.

More new carbon market proposals
There are a serious of other proposals on the table too. These include a whole paper from Korea advocating a National Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMA) "crediting mechanism," ie. carbon market credits in relation to emissions benchmarks, which would be set in non-binding national action plans. Norway has a proposal on NAMA carbon credits that ostensibly looks quite similar.

The South Africa delegation, which appears to have swallowed an acronym dictionary, suggests that "NAMAs may comprise individual mitigation actions, sets of actions or programmes. Developing countries may choose from a variety of forms of action, including SD PAMS, REDD, programmatic CDM, no lose sectoral crediting baselines and others"

These are mostly market-mechanisms, although Sustainable Development Policies And Measures (SD PAMS) and REDD can be market-based or regulatory.

By contrast to all the above, Brazil seems to suggest that NAMAs should not generate offset credits.

Watering down EU ambition
Another new and re-iterated aspect of the EU´s proposals relates to its emissions reduction target of 20 per cent to be achieved irrespective of the agreement - although most of this could, if the EU wanted, be met with reductions from abroad - and 30 per cent in the context of an international agreement.

In a joint submission with Australia, Belarus, Canada, Norway, Switzerland and Ukraine, it is reported that the EU defines the 30 per cent as "including Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry." These emissions are notoriously difficult to verify, for which reason they are currently excluded from the EU´s Emissions Trading Scheme. They also don´t count towards the 20 per cent target.

Including LULUCF "reductions" would help the EU to meet its "more ambitous" target without making that task more ambitious, as a result of which they are included. To give a sense of scale of the difference that might make, the current figures on LULUCF from the European Environment Agency are as follows (countries can choose whether or not to count these towards their current Kyoto Protocol reduction target): "Overall, activities under Articles 3.3 and 3.4, thirteen EU‐15 Member States are projected to remove 57.5 Mt CO2 per year of the commitment period. This is equivalent to 17% of the EU‐15 reduction commitment of 341 Mt CO2 per year of the commitment period, or 1.3 of the 8% reduction target."

That needs decoding. Articles 3.3 and 3.4 relate to aforestation and reforestation (tree planting). 341 Mt is how much CO2 per year the EU is commited to reduce. This means that LULUCF changes accounts for a net decrease of around 1.3 per cent of the EU´s overall emissions, but this is almost one-fifth of the action needed to make a reduction.

In other news: binding reductions for China?
The emergence of a US negotiating position of sorts has been reported with a flurry of excitement about how it has, in turn, pushed China closer to a position from whichit could strike a deal. In fact, the Guardian report names an unofficial source, who floats a potential commitment to "intensity targets." These are not emissions reductions, but relate to the proportion of emissions per unit of GDP. If the economy grows, emissions will be carried along with it.

REDD plus
On deforestation, various countries make proposals for REDD plus. According to the Bali Action Plan of December 2007, which kicked off the current negotiation round, this means: “Policy approaches and positive incentives on issues relating to reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries; and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in developing countries”.

REDD-Monitor explains some of the drawbacks here

The best of these positions is from Bolivia which argues for this to be directly funded rather than tied to the carbon market. It says:

"1. A fund based mechanism allows for equitable distribution of funds.
2. It will not allow for off-set mechanisms.
3. Is more likely to ensure environmental integrity.
4. Is able to protect the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities as there is no transfer of rights of carbon ownership to the market.
5. Ensures sovereignty and national as well as local control over REDD-plus activities. Where the REDD plus activities must be framed under the national laws and policies and to not affect the national interests.
6. Forest conservation can be funded, including adaptation activities related to forests."

Climate finance
Some of the key debates concern financing. China, amongst other things, restates that:

"The developed country Parties shall fulfill their financial commitments under the Convention in a measurable, reportable and verifiable manner; any funds pledged outside the UNFCCC shall not be regarded as the fulfillment of commitments by developed country Parties for the implementation of Article 4.3 of the Convention and the Bali Action Plan."

The implication of this is that it still does not accept that controversial World Bank Climate Investment Funds would be counted as financial commitments from developed nations. These funds have the backing of (and funding from) the EU and US, amongs others.

EU Commissioner Stavros Dimas recently let slip that climate financing for development"will have to be both brand new funds and existing development monies." He then stressed that "mostly it should be new," but the fear lingers on that a lot of this money will be a repackaging of previous commitments, topped up by revenues from carbon markets.

Ad Hoc Working Group on Kyoto Protocol update, aka how to expand carbon markets and count emissions increases as reductions

I´ve discovered the latest cure for insomnia, which is freely downloadable in the form of the Chair´s summary of the "AD HOC WORKING GROUP ON FURTHER COMMITMENTS FOR ANNEX I PARTIES UNDER THE KYOTO PROTOCOL," Seventh session, Bonn, 29 March to 8 April 2009

(Incidentally, the Chair in question is Harald Dovland who until fairly recently had a consultancy on carbon markets for Poyry plc.)

Don´t fall asleep just yet, though, because it´s a real shocker! Pretty much every half-baked scheme for expanding carbon markets is under discussion - a bore for ordinary climate-concerned citizens, but a wet dream for carbon traders.

At present, there´s fairly broad agreement that the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) isn´t working (International Rivers have produced a good summary of how and why it fails, and you´ll also find more materials at www.carbontradewatch.org). When you´re in a hole, the best advice is normally to stop digging and climb out while you can. Unfortunately, the solutions being considered by the UN amount to throwing away the shovel and rolling in a JCB... taking the very worst elements of the current system, such as the unknowable fictions of "additionality," and generalising them. The net result would be a massive expansion of carbon markets that would, in the process, redefine all manner of hypotheticals and even pollution increases as "emissions reductions."

What follows is a point by point summary, with annotations and key clauses pulled out

Sinks, nukes and Carbon Capture and Storage in the CDM?
This first section has to do with debates on what can additionally be included in CDM - possible reforms to LULUCF provisions (land use, land use change and forestry); and a debate on the inclusion of Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) and nuclear power in the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). This is bad enough, potentially, although the more troubling parts are what follows...

Sectoral carbon markets
Like all of what follows, these are not agreed measures, but simply what is under discussion. So it is not too late to kick up a stink about it.

However, if sectoral carbon markets come into existence, this is what is proposed:

12. A sectoral crediting mechanism is established. A non-Annex I Party may propose to the CMP a crediting target for emissions or removals within a defined sector to be achieved through national actions. Reductions in emissions by sources in the sector below the crediting target, or enhancements in removals by sinks in the sector above the crediting target, shall result in the generation of credits which may be used by Annex I Parties to meet their emission commitments under Article 3, paragraph 1.

In other words, a target for emissions within a specific sector in the South can be treated as and traded for a reduction in industrialised countries. But there is no provision in this or the subsequent paragraphs for this to actually be a reduction - it is simply decided to be so by an expert group that reports to the CMP (which is the Meeting of Parties to Kyoto Protocol).
This potentially allows for a massive expansion of carbon trading beyond the "project-based mechanisms"

How is the target set? It explains...

14. A crediting target shall be [set below the level of projected anthropogenic emissions by sources of GHGs within the sector boundary or above the sum of the projected changes in carbon stocks in the carbon pools within the sector boundary] [as a carbon intensity target below the level of the projected carbon intensity of emissions by sources of GHGs within the sector boundary].

In other words, a reduction may be defined as anything below projected emissions... in essence, generalising "additionality" to whole sectors, while at the same time removing the need for even a cursory project-by-project assessment. Alternatively, and even worse, the target could be an "intensity" target, which is actually a ratio of emissions relative to economic output (expressed as GDP). The key point with the latter is that it is not absolute, so if GDP grows then the allowable amount of emissions grows with it... meaning that increased emissions can be traded as "reductions" (!)

15. The sector boundary for a sectoral crediting activity shall encompass all anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of GHGs that are reasonably attributable to the defined sector.

Here sinks are treated as emissions reductions - in other words, what counts are not actual emissions but the net effect when the offsetting of tree-sinks, gas capture (and CCS, if is allowed, which is not just for coal but is also being pushed for major industries like steal).

Targets would be determined on a country-by-country basis.

Crediting on the basis of nationally appropriate mitigation actions

24. [The baseline for a NAMA registered as a CDM project activity shall be the scenario that
reasonably represents the anthropogenic emissions by sources of GHGs within the NAMA boundary, or the sum of the changes in carbon stocks in the carbon pools within the NAMA boundary, that would occur in the absence of the project activity.] [A portion of verified emission reductions that result from a NAMA may generate NAMA credits.]

Square brackets in these kinds of negotiations mark out those parts of the negotiating text that are not agreed, typically the more contentious text.

The NAMA proposal is another means of generalising the fiction of "reductions" beyond simply the project-based mechanisms. At the moment, each project has to tell a story of how emissions would have increased if the project didn´t exist, and show that carbon financing is necessary for it to happen. The problem is that no one knows the future, and all manner of implausible fictions can be elaborated ("we would have burnt coal if we didn´t burn biomass," etc.). This type of scheme generalises that same flawed Enron-accounting, and abstracts even further from the actual local context. Now, a story of how a whole sector in a whole country would otherwise develop can be taken as the basis for calculating reductions...

This proposed "NAMA crediting" seems to incorporate existing programmatic CDM (pCDM) proposals, as well as overlapping with the sectoral mechanism described above. Some of how it might work is rather obscure though.

The ways in which credits might be generated is listed as follows:

29. [Types of NAMA that can generate NAMA credits include but are not limited to:
(a) Sustainable development policies and measures, economy- or sector-wide mitigation
programmes, and mitigation activities and projects;
(b) Low-carbon development plans and programmes;
(c) Sector-based mitigation actions and standards;
(d) Actions under paragraph 1 (b) (iii) of the Bali Action Plan;
(e) Technology deployment programmes;
(f) Relevant standards, laws, regulations and targets at a national or sectoral level;
(g) Voluntary cap-and-trade schemes in non-Annex I Parties.]

For example, it is not clear at what stage carbon credits would be issued for "plans and programmes" - at the point at which they are drawn up, or at the point at which they have been implimented?

Here, as elsewhere in the document, social criteria seem weak or non-existent.

Encourage the development of standardized, multi-project baselines

33. [The CDM Executive Board] [A dedicated body constituted by the CMP and operating under its authority] [One or more dedicated bodies established by the CDM Executive Board and operating under its authority] shall define standardized baselines for specific project activity types and specific sectors or subsectors under the CDM by establishing parameters, including benchmarks, and procedures and making them available for [mandatory] [optional] use by project participants and designated operational entities (DOEs) in the determination of additionality and the application or development of baseline methodologies.

In other words, the new criteria for generating carbon credits will be even more lax, in that they would only need to be judged according to generalised and context-free "benchmarks"

Improve access to clean development mechanism project activities by specified host Parties
and
Promote co-benefits for clean development mechanism projects by facilitative means

These two sections address how to waive the rules for certain (to be specified) countries to encourage more carbon market projects there.

Various exemptions are considered. These include waiving "additionality" criteria and a fast-track process for projects.

The co-benefits section is rather confused, in particular this:

46. A DOE shall, as part of its validation of a project activity, confirm [that the designated national authority of the host Party has confirmed that its stipulated co-benefits are demonstrated by the project activity] [that the proposed project activity demonstrates one or more of the following co-benefits:
(a) Energy efficiency;
(b) Technology transfer;
(c) Environmental services such as air pollution reduction, improvement of water quality, proper treatment and reduction of waste, conservation of biodiversity, and management of hydrological resources;
(d) Poverty alleviation;
(e) Economic growth;
(f) Social benefits;
(g) Strengthening human and institutional capacity.]

This seems truly bizarre, and I can´t fully make sense of it. The way it reads, it would mean that a DOE (Designated Operational Entity, ie. consultancies like DNV and Tuv Sud) could verify that a project contributes to "economic growth" (criteria (e)) and, on the basis of this, authorise that other criteria for the project be waived. The result would be that projects leading to "economic growth" in LDCs (say, expansion by a large TNC / extractive industry) could be bought and presented as the same thing as "emissions reductions" in the North?!?!

Introduce multiplication factors to increase or decrease the certified emission reductions issued for specific project activity types

2+2 = 5

Joint Implementation

JI relates mainly to former Soviet countries, although if you look at the JI pipeline (database of current projects) in conjunction with a map you´ll see that some of the largest registered projects are located in the former West Germany.

They are considering including nuclear in JI.

Emissions Trading

This section relates to Annex 1 countries, ie. most of the rich industrialized ones.

Much of this is a reiteration of what went before, with the aim of rendering emissions trading consistent with the sectoral proposals in relation to CDM.

What it also proposes, though, is that a means be established for "Non-Annex I Parties" to directly involve themselves in cap-and-trade schemes, which opens the door (without need for further international agreement) for the linking up of these in order to create a global carbon market

60. Non-Annex I Parties may participate in emissions trading on the basis of agreed emission targets established for sectors. The emission target for a sector shall be set below the level of projected anthropogenic emissions by sources of GHGs within the sector boundary, or above the level of projected enhancements in removals by sinks of GHGs within the sector boundary, and shall be based on the most recent available data. The sector boundary shall encompass all anthropogenic emissions of GHGs that are reasonably attributable to the sector in question.

Again, sinks are treated as the same as reductions

61. A participating non-Annex I Party shall be issued with emission allowances corresponding to its sectoral target. Parties may devolve emission targets and allowances to legal entities.

"Legal entities" is the polite term for corporations. It is not yet clear what the implications of this clause might be. Any suggestions?

Introduce emissions trading on the basis of nationally appropriate mitigation actions

66. [CERs] [Credits] that are generated on the basis of a [NAMA registered as a CDM project activity] [NAMA] may be transferred and acquired under international emissions trading pursuant to Article 17.9

A CER is a CDM reduction unit. This clause is a legal provision to ensure that the whole vast swathe of new "sectoral" credits are "fungible" (ie. exchangeable with) reductions in the Annex 1 (rich, industrialised) countries.

Introduce modalities and procedures for the recognition of units from voluntary emissions trading systems in non-Annex I Parties for trading and compliance purposes under the Kyoto Protocol

69. Where a national or regional emissions trading scheme implemented on a voluntary basis by a non-Annex I Party or non-Annex I Parties meets specific eligibility requirements, emission allowances [and other units] issued under the scheme may be transferred and acquired internationally, and may be used by Annex I Parties to meet their emission commitments under Article 3, paragraph 1.

Please, somebody, send the UNFCCC a dictionary with the definitions of the words "mandatory" and "voluntary" highlighted...

Relax or eliminate carry-over (banking) restrictions on Kyoto units

All possible banking options (except no banking) are on the table, including this: "There shall be no restrictions on the carry-over of Kyoto units to a subsequent commitment period."

The problems with this are illustrated by what could already happen under the first commitment period (to 2012). Currently, through a combination of “hot air” credits (emissions reductions from Ukraine and Russia due to industrial decline and restructuring since the 1990 baseline established by the Kyoto Protocol) and the US non-ratification of Kyoto, there is likely to be a significant surplus of Assigned Amount Units (AAUs, Kyoto reduction units) by 2012. If these are carried over, it would represent a serious loophole in any post-2012 scheme – allowing historical reductions as a result of economic restructuring in the former Soviet bloc, and over-estimations based on the behaviour of George Bush, to be counted as equivalent to future domestic actions by the UK and other Annex I countries...

Other possible improvements to emissions trading and the project-based mechanisms under the Kyoto Protocol

There´s more to come! This last section contains a list of other live issues, some of them positive (restrictions on CDM, JI, etc), some negative, a number contested as to whether it is within the mandate of the AWG-KP to discuss them.

There are a few worrying ones in there too. These include a range of proposals for JI similar to what is detailed for CDM. Perhaps worst of all is this:

III. Emissions trading
A. Eliminate restrictions on the trading and use of certain Kyoto unit types under national and regional emissions trading schemes

In other words, a legal provision that would prevent discrimination on the types of units. For example, in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, the use of CERs originating from 20MW large scale hydroelectric dams is restricted, etc. The above proposal would seek to overturn that decision.

And that´s all folks. Tune in next time... another round of UN climate negotiations takes place in June 2009 in Bonn, Germany.

Unspinning Darling’s climate claims

Alistair Darling claims that auctioning EU pollution permits will encourage investment in renewable energy. But the Treasury backs the opposite view in Europe, while continuing to push nuclear power.

It’s becoming an iron law of budgets that the initial spin gives way to a far less attractive reality. The first Budget since Brown was supposed to have a green streak running right through it. But several of Alistair Darling’s environmental claims fail to stack up.

Carrier bags grabbed the headlines – and there are, indeed, may good reasons to charge for their use or, better still, ban them altogether. But to mention these in the context of climate change strategies looks suspiciously like ‘greenwash’. As the environmentalist George Marshall points out, ‘An average plastic bag produces 31 grammes of Carbon Dioxide, about the same as comes from driving my car 90 metres. That doesn’t get me very far towards the supermarket. If I was in a jetplane it wouldn’t get me to the end of my garden.’

A more serious, though less headline-grabbing, flaw lies in Alistair Darling's claim that the European Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) can be used to 'encourage investment in low-carbon technology and in energy renewables', aided by the auctioning of allowances for energy generators. This is misleading for several reasons.

Darling claimed that ‘we have helped build the Emissions Trading Scheme to curb the amount of carbon produced by generators and large industrial users.’ What he failed to add is that it didn’t work. In its first phase, the ETS awarded windfall profits to these large-scale polluters, but there is no evidence that carbon trading actually reduced any emissions. In fact, the corporate lobbying around the scheme was so fierce that, in 90 per cent of cases, the ‘caps’ on emissions failed to cap anything, proving far less effective than conventional regulation.

He also claimed that 100 per cent of the permits awarded to energy generators should be auctioned. This reflects the European Commission’s position, but distorts the bigger picture. In other sectors, the EU has proposed that many of these permits to pollute need not be auctioned until 2020, and it provides a huge get-out clause that would potentially allow all of them to be given away free even then.

The idea that this scheme would generate investment in low-carbon technology and renewables is also highly questionable. Indeed, the European Commission has suggested that only 20 per cent of these auction revenues need be directed towards alternative energy investment. An Ecofin meeting of European finance ministers on 12 February (at which Angela Eagle represented the Treasury) balked at even this modest proposal, rejecting any EU-wide target for 'mandatory earmarking' whatsoever.

Where Darling is more accurate is in his assessment that such measures will encourage investment in nuclear energy. In fact, as the World Information Service on Energy (WISE) has shown, the government’s promise of unilateral action to underpin the price of carbon can best be read in relation to its nuclear policy – providing a means to provide indirect subsidies to this industry in a situation where direct subsidies look politically unacceptable.

The larger point is this. If the incentives to act on climate change are focused mainly on price, what happens is that the richest actors in the market are allowed to buy their way out of responsibility, while perverse incentives are created for the nuclear industry or the dirtiest forms of oil exploration (as BP’s recently stated intention to extract oil from Canadian ‘tar sands’ has shown).

Such proposals are far from green.

Climate change and dead canaries

Last December, as the UN climate conference was basking in hot sunshine (with frequent gusts of hot air blown from the mouths of government and industry delegates), NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally reviewed data that Arctic sea ice could melt entirely by the summer of 2040 and found that, in fact, this process could happen by the summer of 2012.

"The Arctic is often cited as the canary in the coal mine for climate warming. Now as a sign of climate warming, the canary has died. It is time to start getting out of the coal mines" said Zwally, who as a teenager hauled coal.

The reason such predictions can be so wrong is that climate change is not a linear process, but is subject to a whole series of feedback loops and tipping points. A lot of scary evidence for this is presented in a new report from Friends of the Earth Australia, entitled Climate Code Red

EU ETS: the emissions trading handouts continue

Those of you interested in the EU's Emissions Trading Scheme (and frankly, with a title like that, how could you not be?) might be interested to learn that the EU's claims that it will start auctioning its 'permits to pollute' are dubious, at best. Ok, if you haven't got the faintest what I'm on about, click here .

Despite the EU's claim that auctioning will become ‘the basic principle for allocation’ under the new ETS after 2012, the European Commission's draft directive sets up so many exceptions to this rule that it is hard to see what happened to the rule at all:

* First, it names the risk of ‘carbon leakage’ – 'ie. relocation of greenhouse gas emitting activities from the EU to third countries and thereby increasing global emissions.' as a result of its climate policy. This is used to justify the fact that most polluting sectors of the economy will continue to receive free permits to pollute; and that in others the ‘transition’ from free permits to auctioned ones is delayed for several years - despite the acknowledged urgency of the climate crisis.
* Second, the terms of this transition from a system of 'free' to 'auctioned' permits are lax. There will still be free allocation of 80% of allowances in 2013, decreasing year on year ‘by equal amounts’ until ‘no free allocation in 2020’. In other words, the majority of permits to pollute will still be given away until the middle of the next decade.
* Third, it is also proposed that a Commission study will identify by 30 June 2010 which sectors are affected by carbon leakage, and potentially allow these energy-intensive industries to receive ‘up to 100% of allowances free of charge’. This will be re-assessed every three years, so polluters who fail in their lobbying first time out can have several more bites.

To summarise what's happening here (in case you've not read the whole EU Draft Directive): the shift from a system of free permits to allowances is delayed, with the potential that it won’t happen at all. Where allocations are given away, windfall profits for the EU’s most polluting companies will continue. Where they are auctioned, windfall profits for the EU can be expected. Only 20% of that money will be ring-fenced for reinvestment in renewables or for contributing to funding for the poorer electricity users and countries… from whom the property rights to this ‘carbon’ were stolen in the first place!

It strikes me that there is a genuine problem that is being addressed here – ie. the EU can set rules on pollution domestically, but if these are not matched elsewhere in the world then factories could fly to those places where there are fewer environmental restrictions. However, (1) threats of this nature tend to be overstated as a lobbying ploy by industry to extract favourable terms from the EU: the real costs of relocation and the infrastructure needed to maintain certain industrial locations are high and may outweigh what could, in practice, only be a short-term economic benefit of relocating to avoid EU caps. A far more important point is (2) that this is a problem of the EU’s own making, since it is aggressively pursuing free trade policies (now rebranded as ‘global Europe’) that encourage a race to the bottom to undermine standards; (3) the EU's caveat to all this - namely, that it must also abide by WTO rules - disavows the EU’s role in making those rules in the first place. If you don’t worship at the alter of free trade, by contrast, this is a non-issue: there are various was of regulating to ensure emissions reductions without having to make concessions to insure against flighty capital.

And finally, in case you were ever stuck on how to rebrand failure as success, try taking some lessons from the EU:

The failed 2005 to 2007 ETS is now referred to as the “first ‘learning-by-doing’” phase. This phase ‘successfully established free trade of emission allowances across the EU, set up the necessary infrastructure… developed into the world’s largest single carbon market…’ etc….. hang on, there’s something missing from this list… successfully established a market, right, but what about actually achieving any emissions reductions? … “However, the environmental outcome of the 1st phase of the EU ETS could have been more significant [you don’t say…] but was limited due to excessive allocation of allowances in some Member States and some sectors, which must mainly be attributed to reliance on projections and a lack of verified emission data.” Ah, I see, nothing to do with excessive corporate lobbying meaning that the caps on this ‘cap and trade’ scheme were set so high that they didn’t actually cap anything…

Pissing on environmental protection

According to the ETC Group, a private geoengineering company recently received an official “go signal” to dump 500 tonnes of urea into the Sulu Sea near the Philippines for a large scale “carbon sequestration” experiment without an Environmental Impact Assessment. The experimental urea dumping may happen this year. This is one of a number of spurious ‘ocean fertilisation’ schemes. Full story is here.