EU policy goals and U.S. values

To follow up on the outcome of the meetings of the EU last week, I turned to the Presidency Conclusions, published by the Council of the European Union on march 14. In the Climate Change and Energy section, I found a summary of the goals and assessments made during the summit. In a nutshell, the EU hopes to agree on a package of proposals "before the end of 2008 [to] allow for their adoption within the current legislative term, at the latest early in 2009." As far as creating a new kyoto... "The objective is to secure an ambitious, global and comprehensive post-2012 agreement on climate change at Copenhagen in 2009 consistent with the EU's 2°C objective."

I was particularly interested in how the EU plans to ease its member countries into the transition to a low carbon economy, as fear of this transition has seemed to be a major impediment to action on reducing carbon emissions in the United States. According to the report, the EU has identified the main challenges of the transition to be maintaining: "sustainable development, competitiveness, security of supply, food security, sound and sustainable public finance and economic and social cohesion."

To address these challenges, and the effects they will have on the economy, politics and citizens, the EU compiled a list of policy goals:

• developing coherent R&D and innovation policies at European and national levels;
• unlocking the business potential of eco-industries and developing a sustainable
industrial policy and sustainable and globally competitive lead markets, while taking into account the impact of Energy and Climate Change measures on competitiveness;
• promoting a sustainable transport system which allows Member States, in the
framework of EU policies, to take necessary measures to combat climate change
effectively;
• considering a review of the Energy Taxation Directive to bring it more closely into line with the EU's energy and climate change objectives;
• improving energy and resource efficiency in all sectors;
• informing the consumer about the efficient use of energy in order to tackle social
impacts and opportunities of Energy and Climate Change.

Of these goals, those which speak most powerfully to me are: "unlocking the business potential of eco-industries" and "informing the consumer about energy use and opportunities of Energy and Climate Change". I think that once these two key components are identified on a national scale, then the rest will follow.

To clarify, however, I think that (at least in the U.S.) the consumer needs to be informed not only about efficient energy use, but first and foremost, the consumer must be able to identify with some deeper impetus for making life-style changes to stop global warming. Even after a consumer is acquainted with the potential opportunities for economic development (inherent in transferring to a low carbon economy), they may still, out of inertia, not change their habits. In order to change their habits, they must first identify with some value associated with a low carbon economy (think Shellenberger and Nordhaus). Perhaps there has already been a shift in values in the European Union, whereby consumers are ready to take risks (and maybe even make sacrifices) for reducing total carbon emissions. In the United States, however, this formidable barrier must still be crossed before we can begin to realistically consider policy options like those listed above.

how the EU can make emission caps effective

The previous post made mention of the summit taking place this week in the European Union to create a comprehensive cap-and-trade package for member countries. According to a news story yesterday in Reuters, the EU sees more value (in terms of preventing anthropogenic climate change) in a cap-and-trade system than in offsetting carbon emissions:

"If developing countries continue to be only offset suppliers we simply will not reach (desired) emissions levels," the Commission's Head of Emissions Trading, Yvon Slingenberg, told a carbon market conference in Copenhagen."We need a re-think. (Emissions cuts) would become more the contributions of developing nations," she told reporters. "(We want) a gradual shift from offsetting to cap and trade."

Aside from serious implications for the growing carbon market, the shift from carbon offsets to cap and trade still calls for control on leakage, as outlined in the previous post on this blog. The primary goal of the EU is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to slow and ultimately stop climate change (global warming). However, it is no less important to minimize the potential problems of leakage and reduced competitiveness of EU industries. To these ends, the summit this week will seek ways to globalize the impacts of their program.

According to The Canadian Press, one of the ways in which this will be accomplished is for EU countries to impose trade and other sanctions on both industrializing and industrialized countries who refuse to sign on to a new international accord to cut greenhouse gas emissions (the new Kyoto). Wake up, U.S.A., they mean us. The United States has traditionally been a world leader in matters of stewardship for human rights and security, but in the case of human-induced climate change (perhaps the #1 threat to global security), we have done nothing but drag our feet, arguing about the validity of the science to buy time for inaction. I applaud the European Union, and I hope they are not afraid to stand up to us in order to finally get us to change our ways. Through the use of sanctions, the EU will not only solve the problems of leakage and competitiveness, but it may also succeed in spurring the U.S., China, and other emissions giants into reducing their output of greenhouse gases.

leakage

The idea of leakage has arisen in a few of my blog postings, so I thought it would be a good idea to examine the meaning of this term. On February 25, I listed a few measures which must be taken in order to validate carbon offsets. One of these is that the seller of the offset must provide "evidence for no increase in emissions elsewhere as a result of project". In a nutshell, this explains the issue of leakage.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Third Assessment Report, from 2001, gives a clear description of leakage in the mitigation section of the report:

"Leakage refers to the situation in which a carbon sequestration activity (e.g., tree planting) on one piece of land inadvertently, directly or indirectly, triggers an activity which, in whole or part, counteracts the carbon effects of the initial activity. It can be shown that most of these types of problems arise from differential treatment of carbon in different regions and circumstances, and the problem is not unique to carbon sequestration activities but pervades carbon mitigation activities in the energy sector as well."

A simple example of leakage, provided by the report, is when a piece of land or wetland set aside for preservation results in a different piece of land being cleared instead. A more complex instance of leakage can arise when carbon forests are paid for timber and carbon credits, but industrial forests are only paid for wood production, and not for carbon credits. In this scenario, timber companies may invest less in new forests, in anticipation of future timber production from carbon forests. Some of the carbon credits gained from carbon forests would therefore be nullified by the reduction in new forest planting by the timber industry. According to the IPCC's 2001 report:

"Leakage from industrial forests, resulting from forests established for carbon purposes, has been estimated by Sohngen and Sedjo (1999) to be about 40%, globally, assuming that all carbon forests are made available to the timber market."

The report suggests that national caps on total emissions would help alleviate the problem of leakage within national boundaries. In order to resolve the problem of leakage between nations, however, global caps would have to be implemented. This week, members of the European Union are meeting to discuss just such a system. They are working on the implementation of a cap-and-trade package which would require industrial emissions to be cut by 20% by the year 2020. Some have expressed concerns that capping industrial emissions in European countries will simply drive industries to countries outside of the EU. The resulting leakage would not only make industrial emissions caps ineffective in terms of reducing global atmospheric greenhouse gas levels, but it would also penalize those industries adhering to emissions caps within the EU. According to an article published yesterday in The Canadian Press:

"To prevent such "carbon leakage," the EU will insist on an international emissions plan to make the fight against climate change truly global and to create a level playing field for industries worldwide. The EU has said its emission system can easily be linked to a global network of pollution auctioning rights."

More about how the EU will impose and enforce an international emissions plan in the next post...

the role of the climate scientist

On Thursday, I listened to Jim White give the 'keynote address' to an international group of scientists in Boulder for the annual Arctic Workshop. The workshop was held at INSTAAR this year, and, given the extreme sensitivity of polar regions to climate perturbations, many of the talks and posters featured work related to global warming. Jim's talk was titled 'IPY: not just a year, it's a responsibility'. Most readers are probably scratching their heads right now, thinking... IPY? This year is the International Polar Year, a year of conferences and public outreach aimed at raising awareness of the importance and vulnerability of polar regions in the face of impending climate change.

Jim's talk was aimed at long-time friends and colleagues in the tightly-knit arctic research community, and, as such, it was not simply a recap of the science, challenges, and potential solutions to the global warming threat. It was more along the lines of a call-to-arms to those people who have the greatest potential to instigate public and political action to stop global warming. Scientists, particularly climate scientists, have a unique role to play right now. Those who understand our climate have the responsibility to step up and explain the science, clarify the role of uncertainty, and advocate for large-scale changes to be made so that we won't have to face the catastrophes and surprises that will inevitably come to pass when atmospheric CO2 reaches 500ppm... 600ppm... 800ppm... and it won't take much to reach those levels...

carbon karma on sale now... terminal B... next to Chili's

I flew out of Denver International Airport this weekend, and remembered having heard that DIA was planning on setting up vending stations for carbon offsets in its terminals. Intrigued by the idea of a Carbon Footprint Slimming Station alongside the Dunkin' Donuts, the Taco Bell, and the Snack and News Stand, I did a little research to find out if this is actually DIA's intent. In a recent article in the Rocky Mountain News, I found that, yes indeed, by August of this year, there will be vending machines of this nature in the airport. The plan is to offer folks the option to buy offsets (likely in the form of reforestation in Brazil and solar panels in India) equal to the emissions incurred during their air travels.

Upon initial consideration, it seems like a decent idea- for those of us who feel guilty flying, it's an option to redeem ourselves and relieve any bad carbon karma. But in reality, is this a sound and ethical solution to the problem of CO2 in the atmosphere? Here we are, creating new technologies and new marketing schemes (yes, marketing schemes... DIA will take up to a 14% cut of all sales of carbon offsets in its terminals) to address a problem that cannot be solved by offsets in the long run. Even if we could perfect our ability to quantify the balance between carbon drawn down or precluded from emission by reforestation and solar, versus the carbon emitted by one person's decision to fly in an airplane, we still would only be achieving carbon neutrality. At some point, we are going to have to change our habits and begin cutting back on energy-expensive activities, or find clean alternative means to the ends we seek.

On another note, I am disturbed by the public reaction to this issue; the comments posted on the Rocky Mountain News website in response to this article express nothing but distrust of the players in the carbon market and scorn for the so-called "suckers" who would purchase offsets equivalent to their travel emissions. It is scary to think that the general public may have absolutely no intention of pursuing this option, but I can certainly understand why consumers would be critical or suspicious of the idea. For one thing, people have trouble buying into the idea that buying solar panels for the other side of the world could possibly have any positive benefits for the American traveler. Wouldn't it be a far more marketable and effective (and, frankly, believable) idea to use money earned by offset sales to install solar panels on the roof of the airport itself? Or to invest in wind farms at least in the same state? I can also see why people would be cynical of a "big-corporate-airport-owner's" sales ploy to save the world... especially when DIA is taking a cut of would-be offset money for their own 'administrative' uses.

more about trees...

Thanks to Chuck, for posting a question about the February 25 entry. His question was: "Do tree-based carbon offsets work off of predicted future growth, or actual real time growth?"

To investigate this question, I turned, of course, to the world wide web. After a good surfing session, the only thing I can come up with is that methods for calculating offsets can vary from company to company. Terrapass, a popular seller of other types of carbon offsets, suggests that the most common way that companies market carbon offsets from reforestation is by advertising sequestration rates of 40 year old trees. There is an obvious problem with this ploy, given the fact that saplings and young trees don't sequester nearly as much carbon as a 40 year old tree. This is just one of the reasons cited by Terrapass for not using this method of carbon sequestration. Other reasons they list are: sales of offsets for reforestation make the hefty assumption that the forest will be permanent, and that the trees won't die or burn, also it is difficult to measure the amount of carbon offset by tree planting, thirdly leakage can occur (see 2/25 post), fourth there is some evidence that forests decrease the earth's albedo (reflectivity) enhancing global warming, fifth monoculture has its own host of issues, and the list goes on. Of course, Terrapass's website may be biased since they don't actually offer this sort of offset, but the opinions and ideas expressed are echoed all over the scientific community.

Whereas selling carbon offsets for tree planting is relatively laissez-faire in the market at large, there are more stringent rules if you wish to register your offsets in some official context. One example is the Wisconsin Emission Reduction Registry, a service of the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. The DNR website offers an explanation of and access to a spreadsheet that anyone can use to calculate the offsets produced by planting a given number of a variety of different types of trees. They also outline a set of rules that must be adhered to if one wants to register voluntary offsets in the state of Wisconsin. These comprehensive guidelines require the budding offsetter to determine the baseline (I'm assuming this means starting conditions of carbon flux on the land to be reforested), quantify their offsets using the aforementioned spreadsheet, verify their offsets, and keep close records of the activity.

By including calculations for tree classification, tree age, growth rate and survival rate, users of the DNR's spreadsheet can determine total carbon sequestered over time as well as individual year carbon sequestration amounts. The Wisconsin Emission Reduction Registry does not allow for aggregation of carbon sequestered over a number of years, however, if emissions can be accurately calculated, then the carbon sequestered by a given tree in a given year can be considered an offset for that year. For instance, the carbon sequestered in 2008 by 4-year-old tree counts for equivalent offsets in the year 2008, but you can't also consider the tree's total life-time carbon sequestration. At least, that's how I understand it.

At any rate, to the best of my knowledge, there is not a universally mandated procedure for calculating the carbon offsets for planting trees, unless you wish to register your offset with a group like the Wisconsin Emission Reduction Registry. Until there are stricter regulations, I don't view this method as either very reliable or effective. It is wonderful to plant trees, and there are a host of positive environmental contributions associated with restoring native forests to deforested lands. I am suspicious of this activity, however, in terms of its efficacy in offsetting the CO2 spewing out of my tailpipe.