I don't understand ... Why didn't you just donate your money to an environmental charity that invests in actually helping the environment? Or better yet, why didn't you donate your money to a charity that helps fight AIDs in Africa, or hunger in Africa, etc?

Seems like those things would have been a better use of the money, even though it wouldn't have made you feel "carbon neutral", as if that term means anything at all. I think that we'll find that these "carbon neutral" firms are just another way of making money off of good-intentioned people.

Carbon Trading is a scam.

Allowing ‘Business As Usual’ with token offsets against dubious schemes is not going to get us out of the climate crisis. We need to slash carbon emissions, not offset them.

Unlike Carbon Trading, a Carbon Tax would lead to a dramatic and sustained increase in the price of carbon emissions. This in turn would cause an immediate increase in energy conservation and a rapid uptake of renewable energy alternatives.

Also unlike Carbon Trading, a Carbon Tax produces revenue that can be used to abolish ‘dumb’ taxes on work and fund eco-tax rebates for pensioners and low-income earners.

As the net amount of tax remains the same there is no net economic impact, and employment will increase as incentives to work are increased.

See www.carbontax.org for more information.

Alan,
Melbourne.

Alan,

There are cases both for and against both trade and tax.

I believe that the main problem with cap & trade schemes is the giving out of allowances (such as in the EU-ETS). The ideal solution would be to auction these off, which would result in almost a hybrid tax / trade situation, and we're seeing a move towards this.

The problem with tax is that there's no guarantee taht your money will be spent on green iniatives; why are people happier giving their money to government that to to emerging cleantech industry?

Unfortunately it is not the 'scam' you suggest. I find it strange that people are happy for companies to make profit out of activities that are BAD for the environment, whilst vilifying companies who try and encourage good behavior.

and for jeff - the point is you cannot quantify the benefit. I could give £10 to oxfam, i've got no idea how my money will benefit, it may mostly go towards administration, in fact there's no guarantee if will have any impact. When you purchase carbon credits there is a verifiable reduction(3rd party by a body accredited by the UN)

There is a lot of mis-understanding regarding carbon trading, and as with many things the devil is in the detail. One major advantage of carbon finance is the ability to leverage capital. You throw money at the margin and enable projects to go ahead.

The current model for trading allows developing countries to participate whereby funds can enable clean and sustainable development.

Tax in the UK will do nothing to help the world achieve a reduction, and the setting of a global tax would be near impossible. Although not perfect, Kyoto is a start at global cap & trade and has bought countries together.

The most likely solution will be a combination of tax and trade instruments, tax for individuals, and trade further up the energy supply chain.

NGOs recognise the benefit of trading schemes and have endorsed a variety of standards for emission reduction projects.

We have to be open to all ideas of how to combat this problem, and to wipe one off the table through cynicism is extremely myopic and fundamentally stupid.

I work in this area and whilst there are many large traditional financial service provdiers and institutions wading in, all the people I work with are in the for the right reasons.

One major issue in the industry is standards, which are discussed openly, the image you portray Jeff and Alan is that there are thousands working in this area rubbing their hands in glee over the gullability of the public - this couldn't be further from the truth.

Maybe we should swap jobs for a day?

Like it or not, trade uses humans' current incentive for profit to drive innovation.

Dear Anonymous,

I was probably too cynical about the Carbon offset business in my earlier post; certainly most of these offsets are much better than nothing.

What frustrates me is that our governments continue to raise billions of dollars/pounds/euros from really dumb taxes (like payroll tax in Australia) while actually subsidising carbon emissions. If they could somehow be persuaded to abolish these taxes and replace them with a Carbon Tax we would be in a much better position. These governments use their support for some future undefined Carbon Trading scheme as a fig leaf to cover their continued inaction.

But Carbon Tax revenue should NOT be spent on 'Green' initiatives. If it was the Carbon Tax could only be quite small for political reasons – it would be a tax rise! If a Carbon Tax is used to replace a whole bunch of 'dumb' taxes than it can be quite large. And if that was the case many current renewable technologies and energy efficiency measures would be substantially cheaper than the current 'dirty' technologies. At that point we start to see really big reductions in emissions that just keep growing. There is no need to subsidise 'Green' initiatives – they will happen because they are cheaper.

A global agreement for each nation to all raise (say) 10% of their revenue from a Carbon Tax is also much more feasible than trying to work out an equitable cap for countries as diverse as China and Australia.

Alan,
Melbourne.

'What frustrates me is that our governments continue to raise billions of dollars/pounds/euros from really dumb taxes (like payroll tax in Australia) while actually subsidising carbon emissions. If they could somehow be persuaded to abolish these taxes and replace them with a Carbon Tax we would be in a much better position.'

Taxes exist to raise revenue, and in the case of the most prominient act as income redistributors. if we *only* had a carbon tax, and the tax was not means tested, the rich would be as rich (and pay to pollute) and the poor would be poor and wouldn't be able to afford to pollute.

Cap & trade is essentially a rationing system, and on a slightly more sociological note, rationing does have the ability to bring people together towards a common cause.

'These governments use their support for some future undefined Carbon Trading scheme as a fig leaf to cover their continued inaction.'

In austalia maybe (although you have had the NGAS since 2003) this is true, however through the UK-ETS (started in 2002),and the subsequent EU-ETS lessons have and are being learnt to improve the system, and it looks as though the 2nd phase will bring about a genuine incentive for reduction. (several countries have taken the EC to court over their tight allocations)

But Carbon Tax revenue should NOT be spent on 'Green' initiatives. If it was the Carbon Tax could only be quite small for political reasons – it would be a tax rise! If a Carbon Tax is used to replace a whole bunch of 'dumb' taxes than it can be quite large. And if that was the case many current renewable technologies and energy efficiency measures would be substantially cheaper than the current 'dirty' technologies. At that point we start to see really big reductions in emissions that just keep growing. There is no need to subsidise 'Green' initiatives – they will happen because they are cheaper.

Now the problem here is winning opinion. I understand your concept to try and play the figures with taxes - this could work to a certain level, however gov will not gain support for the tax if they do not commit some spending to try and help people avoid the tax. If industry is being taxed and we're still in a situation where clean technology is far more expensive than the norm, (ie not commercially viable), innovation and technology transfer incentives will have to come from government coffers. Project based mechanisms in carbon trading offer a flow of funds to innovators and clean tech industry.

'A global agreement for each nation to all raise (say) 10% of their revenue from a Carbon Tax is also much more feasible than trying to work out an equitable cap for countries as diverse as China and Australia.'

No I'd say it is just as hard, if not harder. No country would accept the same tax rate, each country would argue over what would happened to the collected tax (ie UK wants to spend it all on clean tech, but China wants to develop it's army). Each country's tax system differs so much that it would impossible to harmonise.

I'm not completely against some form of taxation at national and consumer level, as I said I think it might work in certain situations, but we do need to think about ability to pay - unless taxes are means tested you could have serious inequality OR not much reduction in GHGs.

I 'm sorry to get personal, but I'm always a little curious of those who are so adement that only one solution will work (especially when we don't have a test case). I've given some support for taxes, question is, can you concede there are benefits in trade?

Anonymous said:
Taxes exist to raise revenue, and in the case of the most prominient act as income redistributors.
Reply:
Those are only two of the reasons for taxes. A third, and very important, reason for taxes is to cause change in taxpayer behavior. Example: "sin" taxes on alcohol and tobacco

Anonymous said:
if we *only* had a carbon tax, and the tax was not means tested, the rich would be as rich (and pay to pollute) and the poor would be poor and wouldn't be able to afford to pollute.
Reply:
This is silly. Like the rich won't find a way around cap and trade? In any case, you could always have a progressive income tax in addition, if that's what you wanted.

Anonymous said:
Cap & trade is essentially a rationing system, and on a slightly more sociological note, rationing does have the ability to bring people together towards a common cause.
Reply:
No, it is NOT a rationing system. In a rationing system, everybody gets their weekly ration and they aren't allowed to trade it. Use it or lose it.

Anonymous said:
...gov will not gain support for the tax if they do not commit some spending to try and help people avoid the tax.
Reply:
People always demand what they think they need. Right now they think they need big SUVs, more roads to the outer suburbs, huge houses, etc. Heavily tax carbon and they will instead demand fuel-efficient vehicles, mass transport, liveable cities, clever use of space, etc. Government and private industry will work together to meet those demands.

Anonymous said:
If industry is being taxed and we're still in a situation where clean technology is far more expensive than the norm, (ie not commercially viable), innovation and technology transfer incentives will have to come from government coffers. Project based mechanisms in carbon trading offer a flow of funds to innovators and clean tech industry.
Reply:
If clean tech is "far more expensive than the norm" then either that particular clean tech is a lousy idea, or else the carbon tax is not yet high enough. My kids don't do their chores because they are so mature and public-minded. They do them because the rewards of obeying and the penalties for disobeying are high enough to overcome their reluctance to perform menial labor. Having once accepted their fate, they then come up with clever ways to do their chores more efficiently.

Anonymous said:
No I'd say [tax agreements are] just as hard, if not harder [than cap & trade agreements]. No country would accept the same tax rate, each country would argue over what would happened to the collected tax (ie UK wants to spend it all on clean tech, but China wants to develop it's army). Each country's tax system differs so much that it would impossible to harmonise.
Reply:
Nonsense. The exact rate doesn't matter, and how the tax is spent doesn't matter. The important thing is that everyone in the world is given a fiscal incentive to reduce carbon emissions.

Anonymous said:
I'm not completely against some form of taxation at national and consumer level, as I said I think it might work in certain situations, but we do need to think about ability to pay - unless taxes are means tested you could have serious inequality OR not much reduction in GHGs.
Reply:
By your reasoning, poor people should get a free ride to release as many GHGs as they want, just for being poor. Besides being blatantly unfair, it is ironic, because GW is predicted to adversely affect the world's poor disproportionately.

Anonymous said:
I'm sorry to get personal, but I'm always a little curious of those who are so adement [sic] that only one solution will work (especially when we don't have a test case). I've given some support for taxes, question is, can you concede there are benefits in trade?
Reply:
Cap and Trade plans are money-making schemes for big banks. They don't produce any benefits that taxing carbon would not also produce, fail to produce benefits that taxing carbon would produce, are needlessly complicated, require international agreements on hotly-disputed issues, and are prone to tampering, fraud, and money-laundering on a global scale. The only thing that can be said for them is that they MIGHT be better than nothing.

A Carbon Tax (or levy, since people don't like taxes) can raise money for green technology, but isn't practical for replacing other taxes and reducing carbon emissions because the necessary reductions are so large (more than 90% in USA and Australia) that the tax base would virtually disappear. Increasing the rate wouldn't help the tax base because you'd then get a drop to 0% emissions (YIPPEE!) and zero tax!

Cap and Trade helps, but the caps are WAY too high!

I'd go for both - pay for your emissions, but you still can't exceed your cap without offsetting.
Also, tax the carbon trade and depreciate credits with age.

Although international agreements such as Kyoto are better than nothing, we need our governments to virtually ignore these and instead aim for 0% emissions. Only when developed countries show that they can and will reduce their emissions below those of developing countries will we get the necessary cooperation from developing countries.

The way things are going now, it looks like we'll pass at least one climate change tipping point before our governments muster sufficient political will to take adequate action, so Fred doesn't need to worry about gambling with the Earth's future - Our governments have already gambled it away!

Dear Anonymous,

As I conceded before, Carbon Offsets will do some good. Adding a serious price on Carbon will do a lot more good.

Down here we have tax-free brown-coal generated electricity that is so cheap you would be (financially) stupid to put in solar panels. Until solar gets an order of magnitude cheaper it cannot compete against tax-free brown-coal power.

Why should we tax payroll and low incomes while leaving carbon emissions completely un-taxed? Taxes exist to raise revenue AND steer the economy in desirable directions, which is why we tax tobacco & alcohol.

On the social equity side, recall that I said the Carbon Tax can be rebated to no/low income earners so they effectively don’t pay the tax. And if the compensating tax cuts funded by the Carbon Tax favour low incomes they will be better off again. And it’s the rich that have big houses full of plasma TV’s, not the poor!

On the global side, I suggested all nations could agree to at least 10% of their revenue from a Carbon Tax. I would not attempt to add conditions to this, or to exactly harmonise it. As you say, this would doom any agreement. This would translate into a big increase in the price of fossil-energy world-wide, and a commensurate improvement in the viability of renewables.

By the way, I would only advocate a carbon tax applying at the refinery/power station level with the price being passed on to consumers downstream. I have seen proposals for personal carbon tax evaluation….I wouldn’t want to go there!

Cheers,
Alan,
Melbourne.

Dear Alan & Anonymous,

Firstly, I appreaciate the refereshing mature debate. I couldn't agree more with Alan but Anonymous also makes a number of very compelling points.

I'm in favour of a tax-based scheme for the following reasons:
1. The aim is to modify the behaviour of 6.5bil people. We, the consumers, are the culprits, not big (bogeyman) business.
2. Taxing carbon emission at source means the person who ultimately benefit is the one who pay for it. The market will automatically sort itself out & it will be virtually impossible to dodge your responsibility.
3. Current technologies are only cheaper because the true cost is not reflected in the price. Essentially we all contribute indirectly to support the low price of carbon-based technologies. We now know that the debit that has been accumulated will be paid either in money or in blood. I believe it's high time and only fair that those who borrow against my child's future to enjoy pleasures they don't need, pay for it in full.
4. I do not agree with the assumption that the poor will suffer more. The rich consume more, drive more, fly more, etc. As an ex African I can tell you taking away carbon will not change lives much. Not having to compete on muscle power against coal will.
5. Global warming will wreck most economies & destroy the habitat of 100's of millions. In other words, the argument that it's OK for people to continue burning carbon because they're poor is (in my opinion) equivalent to saying it's OK to plunder my house & steal my money because you're poor.
6. Finally, THERE IS NO NEED FOR A GLOBAL AGREEMENT ON TAX, the concept of import taxes have been around for thousands of years. A carbon levy on all imports is all that's required. It's also the best way of forcing non-Kyoto countries to co-operate.

Thank you,
Carel Kriel

There is some straight forward carbon offset information at this blog...

http://greenpieceblog.blogspot.com/2007/10/carbon-offset-information.html

When any fuel is being ignited they emit some kind of exhaust gas, most of the time these gases contain some amount of carbon that affects the environment. In order to reduce this you have to use optional power sources such as sunlight.



......................

Rukshani.

http://www.goinggreenbuzz.com

congratulations for this.
........
Shamu
Social Media Marketing

Welcome to our game world, my friend asks me to buy some twelve sky Gold . I do not know how to use the 12sky gold ; my friend tells me how to use. I will thank for my friends bringing me in this world. I am not regret to buy twelvesky Gold . We all love game, if you want to play it, please buy 12Sky Silver Coins and join us. Please do not hesitate to have 12 sky gold . It is funny.

I am so happy to get some Perfect World Gold and the Perfect World Silver is given by my close friend who tells me that the Perfect World money is the basis to enter into the game.
Therefore, I should Buy Perfect World Gold with the spare money.
I gain some pw Gold from other players.
Then I share the cheap Perfect World Gold with my friends.